“We support the protesters as long as they do it peacefully and as long as they continue to make their demands that there be electoral reform before the next general election, that is, cleansing of the list and the issue of ID Cards,” said Senator Isaac Baptiste. The UWP president made this statement in the light of the demonstrations going on across the country and in response to PM Roosevelt Skerrit’s latest radio address.
Baptiste said his party is in support of protesters demanding for electoral changes, but is not in support of acts of violence that may accompany such protests. He said the UWP did not organize such protests but only supporting the substance of the demands. He also called out the DLP leader Skerrit for insinuating that the protests were organized by the UWP for electioneering purposes.
It started when drawnout protests took over Roseau and other parts of the country by demonstrators who demanded for electoral reforms and a meeting with the President Charles Savarin. The protesters gathered for many days on Victoria Street, residence of the president, for many days and nights demanding audience with him.
They were stopped by metal barricades set up by the police on the street leading up to the president’s house, but after many days of camping out, they broke through the barricade and attacked the police, prompting law enforcers to apply tear-gas to disperse the crowd. Several videos on social media show some pockets of protesters burning garbage, attacking parked vehicles, uprooting plants, blocking the roads, and looting commercial stores.
“We will continue to support them but we will not support any violent actions in that regard,” UWP President Baptiste said in his speech, condemning the violence that followed the protests. “The protest has been going on for the past couple days and the UWP has nothing to do as far as [its] organization [is concerned].”
PM Skerrit in his recent radio address condemned the protests and the associated violence, blaming it on the UWP who possibly wanted to win the December 6 general elections at all costs. The prime minister said the opposition is doing that as “part of an evolving narrative to suggest that law and order have broken down in Dominica and that elections set for December 6th, cannot be free and fair.”
Baptiste this cannot be true, blaming the prime minister for not instituting electoral reforms and the president for seemingly siding with the DLP party. He said Skerrit ought not to have come on the radio to blame the UWP for the protests going on around the country, and demands for equal allotment of time on the state radio to enable the opposition to respond to issues raised by the government.
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