The recent visit to Saint Lucia by Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has fuelled public discourse – before, during and undoubtedly long after his departure.
The unfortunate reality is that we now live in a Saint Lucia where questioning the government’s actions or disagreeing with certain decisions often leads to being labelled as an opposition operative.
Ahead of the president’s visit, little information was provided by the Office of the Prime Minister or the Ministry of External Affairs regarding the precise purpose of the state visit. Instead, we received vague generalisations about “deepening economic and cultural relations”. As a media outlet, we pressed for details but were met with silence, leaving us to relay the limited information available. Naturally, the public, exercising their right as citizens, continued to question the purpose of the visit, whether in the streets, on social media, or through talk shows. Yet, as with so many issues in Saint Lucia, these voices of inquiry, and even those expressing strong dissent, were quickly lumped together with opposition rhetoric from the United Workers Party.
It is deeply troubling that we’ve reached a point where questioning or disagreeing with the government’s actions, policies, or pronouncements is automatically construed as being “against” the government or aligned with the opposition. Do independent voices no longer exist? Does a citizen not have the right to question what happens in their own country? Have we achieved such utopian perfection that there is nothing left to scrutinise or challenge?
The “you’re either with us or against us” mentality is unhealthy and dangerous for any democracy. The people’s voice on any issue, no matter how seemingly trivial, is not irrelevant. It should and must matter, and it should not always be filtered through the lens of political allegiance.
We have previously emphasised the need for the government to enact the Freedom of Information Bill, which would grant citizens better access to information. Yet, time and again, governments wave reports in Parliament, promising to release them “when the time is right”. But who decides when the time is right – and for whom?
Returning to the Nigerian president’s visit, we now know some outcomes: scholarships for Saint Lucian students, visa-free diplomatic travel to Nigeria, and the signing of an MOU with the Ministry of Culture and Creative Industries, among other initiatives. For some, these answers may suffice, while others may remain sceptical, even distrustful, of the visit’s true intentions. And in a functioning democracy, that, too, is acceptable.
What is unacceptable, however, is a government that withholds information, whether from the media or in response to public concern. This is simply not good enough.
As part of his itinerary, President Tinubu addressed a joint sitting of Parliament on Monday, attended by OECS leaders and other officials at the William Jefferson Clinton Ballroom in Sandals Grande, named after US President Bill Clinton, who first visited Saint Lucia in 2003. We recall the then-deputy prime minister dismissing questions about the cost of Clinton’s visit with the phrase, “irrelevant detail”.
Let us hope history does not repeat itself when the local press asks the government at next week’s briefing: How much did the Nigerian president’s visit cost Saint Lucian taxpayers?
