Following the series of events happening around PM Roosevelt Skerrit in relation to his rented Morne Daniel home, the Dominican leader said he would not surrender to threats and harassments since he has the liberty to choose where to live in the country. But leaders of the UWP opposition picked holes in the prime minister’s defence, saying he is becoming a rising dictator on the island.
While Opposition Leader Lennox Linton and other party executives had been voicing their disagreements to the Cabinet-approved $32,000 monthly rent for the PM’s residence, the Concerned Citizens Movement (CCM) last week staged a demonstration close to the PM’s house in protest to the accommodation.
Also, the parliamentary representative for the Roseau North constituency, Danny Lugay, was stopped in his car close to the PM’s residence and whisked away to police headquarters for questioning along the lines of the PM’s accommodation.
Skerrit questioned what he has done to warrant the hatred people nurse for him, saying he has not offended anybody except for the fact that he is the prime minister of Dominica. He however made it clear that people plot his downfall because they want to occupy his position as the political leader of the nation.
“Why do you hate me…?” Skerrit demanded. “Why don’t you like me? What have I done to you? Nothing…you believe that you want to be in this position or you guys want to be in government, and the person you think is preventing you to be there is Roosevelt Skerrit?”
Skerrit insisted that as a Dominican citizen – born and raised on the island – he has the rights to choose where to reside in the country, just as any other individual in the country can determine their place of abode freely.
“No matter where I choose to reside in this part of Dominica, I am a Dominican and people have to respect that, the same way I respect people’s rights to reside wherever they wish and to carry out their duties, but don’t believe ever that you are frightening me,” he stated.
DLP ambassador Loreen Bannis-Roberts has also come to the defence of the prime minister, saying the personal and family security of the prime minister is very paramount and should be beefed up more.
Meanwhile, UWP leader Lennox Linton questioned how he became a threat or source of harassment to the prime minister on account of his residence. He emphasized that he has been living in Morne Daniel for 22 years without any incidence, and wondered how he is harassing Skerrit who just moved to the area. He buttressed the fact that the prime minister’s new residence is paid for with taxpayers’ money, and so the general public has the rights to visit the residence to see what they are paying for.
Linton also wondered how the public road he had been driving on for 22 years in Morne Daniel could become a private property to the prime minister who just took up residence in the area. Former UWP candidate for the Roseau Central constituency, Glenroy “Soso” Cuffy, and expressed his concern with the public road on which Lugay was arrested, wondering why the PM should privatize a public road and accuse users of harassment.
UWP President Isaac Baptiste expressed strong disapproval with Skerrit’s claim of harassment and also decried DLP ambassador Loreen Bannis-Roberts’s call for increased security for the Dominican leader, saying the ambassador is only pandering to the whims of her employer.
Another government critic and social media activist, Halima Karima Amar Thomas Abdulla, also lent her voice to the opposition’s position, adding that the prime minister is only being hypocritical by crying wolf with his residence and personal security. He urged Skerrit to be mindful of the implications of his actions on the population, since failure to do so might paint him as a rising dictator.
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