Caricom observers prepare
The members of a Caribbean Community (Caricom) Electoral Observer Mission in Dominica to monitor Friday’s general election say they have already met with several key players ahead of the national poll.
The mission is led by Barbados’ former chief elections officer Hensley Robinson.
The officials say they have met Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit and his Dominica Labour Party and the main opposition United Workers Party as well as the smaller Dominica Freedom Party.
The observer mission was scheduled to have discussions yesterday with the Dominica Electoral Commission.
More than 60 candidates are contesting the 21 constituencies at stake in Friday’s elections.
An Organisation of American States team is also on the island to monitor the poll.
Senator tells Antigua government to co-operate with US
An Antiguan senator is urging his government to cooperate with US investors who have lost money from investments they made with former Texan investor Allen Stanford.
Government legislator Colin Derrick wants the Baldwin Spencer administrator to heed a warning from US senators threatening to block Antigua and Barbuda’s request for funding from International Monetary Fund to fix the fiscal imbalance in the island’s economy.
Derrick told the Senate that the government has a responsibility to expose anyone who might have been involved with Stanford’s alleged multi-billion-dollar ponzi scheme.
St Kitts working its way off list
The St Kitts and Nevis government says it is now just a handful of agreements shy of reaching a required 12 to get off the grey list of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
The government says it has signed an additional two tax information exchange agreements with New Zealand and Liechtenstein, taking to seven the number of such pacts it has initialled. The agreement facilitates the providing of information that is relevant to a tax investigation.
Aristide supporters protest
Jean Bertrand Aristide supporters took to the streets of the Haitian capital on Wednesday, calling for the return from exile in South Africa, of the former Haitian president.
The demonstrators were also protesting the exclusion of Aristide’s political party from upcoming elections.
Several thousand people joined in the protest march marking Aristide’s rise to power as Haiti’s first democratically elected president in December 1990.
The demonstrators accused the government of President Rene Preval of planning a fraudulent legislative ballot on 28 February (2010). They have threatened to boycott the vote.
