King had to
go.
The straw
that broke the camel’s back was the wrong straw. After all, the opposition
leader doesn’t have inform anyone that he has to attend a meeting of the
highest disaster response authority in the land. He has to attend that meeting
and then, perhaps, report back so that his party can co-ordinate its disaster
relief efforts and or political responses. King was not doing a great job of
being opposition leader, but in the moment after the Christmas rain storms, he
was actually doing the job they accused him of not doing. His disaster response
protocol was the wrong reason for precipitating an end to his tenure as leader
of the opposition. It was the wrong reason to humble him.
But King had
to go.
And Allen
Chastanet had to make sure that the person who took King’s place was beholden
to Allen Chastanet, would speak with Allen Chastanet’s voice and would not feel
good making a move without Allen Chastanet up their butt.
Unfortunately,
such a person does not exist and in his short time as political leader of
Flambeau Allen Chastanet has not showed any signs of cultivating such
loyalties.
And so,
Chastanet is forced to choose the only person with a stupider accent than he
does: Gail Rigobert.
The whole
thing looks good on the surface. With Rigobert, UWP has created a historic
first female Opposition Leader of St Lucia. She was also not part of the last
UWP administration and that certainly helps. These factors propelled her to the
junior deputy leadership of the party ahead of all the veterans and newcomers
who contested the last UWP executive election. And, in spite of her insistence
on talking in an accent that can’t make up its mind whether it’s British or
Yankee, she can’t be any worse than Sarah Flood-Beaubrun (the former political
virgin who went on to betray her party in order to prevent doctors from having
the power to save pregnant women’s lives, create the opening in which Richard
Frederick would become a national, regional and international pain in the ass
and from there get promoted to Caribbean Grand Inquisitor of Gays, Condom
Users, Contraceptive Users and Others Who Would Rather Exercise The Free Will
God Gave Them Rather Than Do What Sarah Says God Wants Them To Do. And yes,
that is actually her real current job description. Lol.)
In choosing
Rigobert, Chastanet appears to be leading the country in the right direction.
Unfortunately, the right direction may not include Chastanet. Consider this:
Rigobert
currently occupies the safest Flambeau seat in the entire universe. The notion
that she might give up the seat in order to install her erstwhile and beloved
leader has already been rejected as something so far out of the realm of
possibility that no one can admit that it was ever even discussed. Chastanet,
meanwhile, still lingers in political no man’s land.
So
basically, Chastanet has done nothing to secure his politically existence and
has ended up promoting the one person in the Flambeau executive who needs him
the least.
The one
person who Flambeaus, Labourites and independents all agreed would have been
the right person to lead the party to complete renewal in the post-Compton era.
Genius. It’s
like he’s committing suicide because he realizes he’ll be bad for St Lucia, but
not before making sure that Flambeau is safe from the forces that made King a
spineless, dangerous leader. If Chastanet was doing this on purpose, he would
be a selfless hero. Unfortunately, he’s still hoping that Kenny and Company
call elections before Flambeau comes to its senses and makes Rigobert the
undisputed heavyweight champion of the United Workers Party.
Kenny,
meanwhile, is weighing his options. The last time he delayed an election hoping
for things to get better, John Compton taught him an unforgettable lesson. But
the thought of losing to Allen Chastanet at anything must be enough to give any
genius pause. If only Kenny could count on Flambeau to act reasonable and do
the right thing for the good of their party, he could just wait to face
Rigobert in the next election and be sure that no matter the outcome at least
Allen Chastanet will never get his chance to ‘fon’ St Lucia.
Unfortunately,
Flambeau has shown no sign that they are learning how to act reasonably in a
timely fashion. Looking how long to get rid of King. And even when they finally
did the right thing, they still did it at the wrong time in the wrong way. And
then, they put a cherry on top by firing King’s staff in the Opposition Leader’s
office instead of trying to find some way to transfer these long-serving but
dangerous Flambeaus to jobs where they could do harm.
Roll over,
Compy. Roll over. You don’t want to see this play out.
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