‘Fire them skin yes’: Premier sacking ministers popular with residents — Vox Pop
File photo: Premier Smith in the thick of things at the May 2018 Decision March.
By Esther Durand, BVI News Staff
Premier Dr D Orlando Smith’s move to sack legislators who conspired to form a new political party while still being part of his administration is largely a popular decision with some residents.
Former NDP legislators Ronnie Skelton and Archibald Christian were fired from their ministerial posts; making way for government backbenchers Marlon Penn, Hubert O’Neal and Alvera Maduro-Caines to accept responsibility for the portfolios that subsequently became available.
BVI News roved the territory’s capital of Road Town this week and sought the opinion of locals on the recent spate of events.
“They coming with their new party [so] I do agree with Premier. Fire them skin, yes. He did the right thing,” said Walter Smith, a technician from Harrigan Estate.
A government employee from Long Trench who opted not to give his name also said he supported the Premier’s decision.
“He’s the Premier, you know? He is the big man. He fire who he wants. You messing up — fire them. He should fire all of them how them man rolling.”
Wayne Todman, a resident from Horse Path told BVI News: “For me, he had to do what he had to do. But, guess what? The Premier ain’t calling the shots, is his wife.”
If you leaving, leave
Meanwhile, an attorney from Solider’s Hill also said the sacked NDP defectors were unreasonable to think they could have remained halfway in and halfway out of Smith’s administration.
“If you leaving, you leaving. You cannot leave and be upset about the Premier’s decision. He had to fire them. That’s like God kicking Lucifer out of heaven and Lucifer saying ‘because my voice so good I thought you would have allowed me to sing on the choir’.”
The attorney continued: “But, with this incident, I am yet to understand how you are going to resign from a party and remain in the position that you were placed in by the party.”
A female civil servant from Crabbe Lot also sided with Dr Smith, who is serving his final stint as Premier.
“They should not expect to stay. He (the Premier) had a right to fire them,” she said.
A plumber over on Jost Van Dyke also shared his perspective with BVI News, stating: “It’s just like they say: ‘If you got a bad hand, you got to cut it off or else it would poison the whole bunch’. They had to go. It could be a big problem in the long run.”
Mixed feelings
While most agreed with the Premier, other residents who spoke with BVI News had mixed opinions.
Another government employee from Long Look said: “First of all, they shouldn’t let the Premier fire them. They knew what they were doing. But the Premier had to do what he had to do. They had to go. As a man, I would go to the Premier and say something, if you say ‘I got nothing to do with you’, [then] I got nothing to do with you.”
Meanwhile, an English entrepreneur residing in the territory said she believes it was virtually pointless to reappoint new persons into the ministerial posts that became vacant.
“They should just call the election,” she argued.
Similar sentiments came from another woman from Fahie Hill who, like most of the respondents, opted not to give their name.
She said the new appointees “are not going to have that position for too long”, adding that she isn’t particularly concerned.
The new appointees
Eighth District Representative, Penn, took over the Ministry of Health and Social Development which was, up to recently, held by Skelton. Dr O’Neal took on the post of Junior Minister of Tourism from Christian while Maduro-Caines is now the Junior Minister for Trade — a post held by Penn up till the point he was appointed as Health Minister.
Skelton was sacked because of a media report that cited him admitting to being the head of a new political party called the Progressive Virgin Islands Movement (PVIM).
Christian, on the other hand, was booted from his position after he had tendered his resignation from the NDP — the party under which he was elected nearly four years ago. He too is now ‘officially associated’ with the PVIM.
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While I support the NDP I will not support wrong doing. This is a load of crap in my opinion. If we hire the NDP to be a Government in the sunshine and they are operating in darkness, we must reject the leader and those supporting the wrong doing.
You are a fraud!
You got to be one of those minions who aid in getting kick backs off of tax payers money!
Clearly you are the fraud! Because NDP is about love of self and not love of country! A bracket all their supported bribed fans fall into!!!
To all the under dogs!!! Stay woke!!!
Sometimes I think these articles are written by Walwyn.
SMITH NEEDS TO FIRE HIMSELF AND HIS WIFE!
They can’t leave soon enough. Problem is that they will not have to be held accountable for their disastrous deeds.
Does that go for all of them or a selected few?
What else you expect that man from Horse Path to say apart from nonsense? Ask him who calling his shots and tall boy shots. These people are living in their own little la la land I swear.
Let me try to answer A….., j…. or women choose 1!
Choose 1? Why not 2 or hell ALL OF THE ABOVE!
I hope aryo conduct this same interview after the NDP is sent home in a couple of months
Popular how ? For you to make such a statement you would have had to have conducted a survey. Or is this just the usual BVI subjective speculation….
Yes the usual limited to a specific set of people speculation!
They have done so many people wrong who are silent! They have dehumanized so many of us, it ain’t funny but God is bigger than this roaring deman we have unleashed in this place…
Not even the stolen tax payers money will be enough to bribe the people to vote them back in! This to shall come to pass!
Amen.
I totally agree with the Premier’s decision to sack them. You cannot form or be a member of a new party and still want to stay with the old party that should not be. It is obvious, that whatever is said among the NDP members will be shared with the newly formed party members.
My thing is that, if they have new ideas, new initiatives, or new strategies for moving this country forward, these new ideas could have been shared with the Premier and the other Cabinet members instead of forming new parties to implement these ideas. This basically tells me that this is a clear motive of greed and power, According to.
According to II Timothy 3:2-5
This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men will be lovers of their own selves, covetous, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, 4 treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.
II Timothy 3:16-17
All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works
You have hit the nail on the head, but these people have the heart to talk about integrity!!! What boggles my mind is when I hear of the proposed make up of the new party and wonder how the hell will it work any different than them being with NDP? I wouldn’t be surprised if the whole thing falls apart before nomination day, Ronnie heads back to Fish Bay about his business and Mitch, his bro and Shaina are in a r– shop somewhere sharing sorrow stories.
I can’t agree with you more. Where is the integrity, they have absolutely none.
How can you have integrity in something that is wrong? It seems like you people are of the notion that they should support the corruption and continued divisiveness!
Give me a break! Wallwind been sourcing people to develop his party! Why no criticism there? Oh that’s right you all must be right on top of the food chain reaping the benefits when they continue to suck the country dry! Set of hypocrites!
Don’t worry tax payers sick of you all, and I know those who reaping off of the stolen taxpayers money is in the minority!
People stay woke!
Go have a warm seat and stop trying to justify nonsense! Forming a party with some of the same waste of time people will do nothing to curb any corruption and divisiveness. If the party was so corrupt and divisive why did Turnbull and Skelton, the main pushers of this new integrity movement campaign so hard to lead the evil pack? If the party was that bad they would have sat that out and form their own thing like they are doing now. The voters are not stupid and they will get a rude awakening come election day. Mitch is the only one on that side that stands a chance and that can change as we don’t know who will contest the seat.
You sound so stupid! Yes we the under dogs have been having warm seats! In fact it is so hot we can’t wait for elections to demonstrate how fed up we are with all the nonsense!
Wrong is wrong and right is right! The only people who engage with any of these parties are those who help them steal tax payers money and then cry how much they love the country!
Their infighting is for power and who can have autonomy over taxpayers money which they heavily use for personal gratification but I don’t need to tell you that because you are probably one of those persons who benefit from this cruel act!
So continue to stand and watch the under dogs pull the rug from right under your feet!
NDP 1 and NDP 2 must go!!!
It’s apparent that you never had the opportunity to work with Wall win!
Why would anyone want to share ideas with an administration that has yet to come forth and acknowledge what they did was wrong? How can you even take anything coming from the head when he switches his tongue every two seconds? The reason for firing them and the true reasons they left hasn’t been published!
How quick are we to forget, this man has already sourced outside people to develop his party before any such behavior was published ( Speaker, Festival, ESHS) when you don’t have all the facts! We should learn how to keep a still tongue!
Wise up!
Ok Dr. T. We got you.
Dr. Hon Premier Daniel Orlando Smith (AL) firing the Hon Archibald Christian (AL) and Hon Ronnie Skelton was not a courageous act. He had no choice but to fire them; the decision was automated and t’ed up for him. IMO opinion they both acted to force the hand of the Premier. The Premier’s action would have been more impressive if had acted quickly to reshuffle ministries when things started to go off the rails. His action would have been more impressive if didn’t let ministers do as they like. operating like governments within a government. His performance would have been more impressive if more effective financial stewardship was executed, $7.2M giveaway to BVI Airways, $1M ESHS Great Wall, ~$30M TPP cost overrun…….etc. What do we want for Christmas? Election now. Call election now.
Well said PO. Dr. Smith’s Legacy as a leader is in tatters after this mass exodus. He is a weak Leader who lacks the courage to control the aggressive and assertive characters around him. Nice Man but politics is not his calling.
NDP 1 or NDP 2 is the same no good NDP!
Doc legacy done dead. He should have stayed in the doctor’s office. Sorry to say but I can’t help it. Not to say he didn’t mean well but he just wasn’t cut out to be a politician. Not everyone was meant to be a politician. Some were called, other just went.
And god forbids he croaks tomorrow, then he will be a visionary and we will hear all the good and glorious things, just like we recently did with Hon. Christopher. We are some evil nasty minded people in this Territory that’s why it cannot get any better.
Let’s call a spade a spade. Those people bolted because they don’t like Myron. It has nothing to do with integrity and all the other buzz words floating around, it’s plain and simple hatred for Myron. It’s all personal nonsense and nothing to do with the country so I’m not falling for it. I will vote for who I think best represents us going forward, tired of this girlish behavior.
It is amazing how gullible folks are to think that the Premier made these decisions unilaterally. All of them men sit down and orchestrated the timing of their resignations from NDP. Doc did nothing special and did exactly what they all had already spoken about and that is to take away their portfolios. He didn’t fire anybody at all. He just took away their responsibility. Yall stop being so foolish and at least act like you know what’s going on!
I really thought Hon Ronnie Skelton was smarter than that, after Archie was fires. I thought he would do the Honorable thing by resigning from the NDP after it was announced that he was the Chairman of the new breakaway party. He loose points big time. It’s embarrassing for him, the NDP and politics in the Virgin Islands. He made a big political blunder in his political career. To be honest, I’m disappointed in him. We will see what will happen. We just got to keep praying for our beloved BVI in the direction it’s heading.
The problem is that you believe whatever the media put out just the way they put it. Ronnie done spoke with Premier long before this news about firing came out.
Not true Ron-ron was upset when he did not win the NDP chairmanship…. after the voting he left the chat He’s a big big disgruntle baby!!
WALWYN was eligible to:
* vote
* run for office
* help the party to win for 2 terms
* hold an office
* now -NOT ELIGIBLE TO HOLD A HIGHER OFFICE TO
LEAD THE PARTY?
* What did he do wrong?
* Why USE AND ABUSE him?
KEY QUESTION—-1. HOW DID JEALOUSY AND GREED GET SO FAR?
I AM SO ASHAME OF THE DEFECTORS.
HOLD FAST, BOSS!!!!
You guys look really bad in many people’s eyes.
In an attempt to hurt Myron Walwyn, you have made yourself look greedy, worthless and with lack of trust in our eyes.
We rallied for you for many years. We admired you as a team.
YOU HAVE HURT AND DISAPPOINTED US!!!!
Do you really expect us to follow you?
Tell us… Base on your academic background, what does the word, ‘PROGRESSIVE’ mean?
You refuse to be a follower. How can you lead us. How can you show progression in our country?
You refuse to be a team player. How can we depend on you?
ADVISE US, PLEASE.