General Elections and Opportunities for Vincentian Sports
No one following what has been happening in St Vincent and the Grenadines over the past several months could possibly claim not to have noticed the concerted efforts being made by the government to appear to take more than a passing interest in sport.
It should also not be lost on anyone that the government of St Vincent and the Grenadines has suddenly found what appears to be a sudden interest in sport, as perhaps the most important tool in its political arsenal, relative to garnering the youth vote. While this may appear strange, coming after 23 years in office, it should not be a surprise to anyone who understands Caribbean political culture and the location of political patronage within it.
In Caribbean politics the youth vote is often considered the most important to victory at the polls. This is because the youths are not committed to the voting patters of their parents. They are often swayed by a variety of factors that may change at short notice as the youths grow into adulthood and understand more about life and the importance of the vote to their conditions at any juncture. The youth in society are therefore often considered responsible for the swings in electoral politics.
Youths in Vincentian politics
There was a time in Vincentian politics when the youths were generally more interested in the dynamics of Vincentian politics. They were the deliberate targets of the several organisations that were spawned in the 1960s and 1970s, and which considered themselves ‘progressive’ elements of society.
The return to local shores of young academics, many of whom were taken in by the popularity of politics that cast them in a ‘progressive’ light, led to an eagerness to be part of the process of political change. Some youth groups got caught up in the Pan Africanist and ‘Black Power’ movements, heavily influenced by young African, American, British and Caribbean thinkers, writers and politicians who resisted the dominance of white capitalism, globally. Other groups opted for the ‘scientific socialist ideological orientation that emerged with the resurgence of Marxism-Leninism around the world and the influence of the ‘Cold War’.
It was most notable, however, that Caribbean youths, however politically progressive they purported to be in the 1960s and 1970s, did not readily engage sport as a vehicle for the change to which they ostensibly committed themselves. Instead, the saw young people, given their ebullience, aggression and tendency towards trends of all types, as making up the numbers needed to challenge the political and economic status quo.
The several movements however petered out, much like the labour rebellions that briefly swept across the Caribbean in the 1930s, and for the same reasons. Once the leaders were sufficiently compromised by largesse offered by ruling parties and leaders of government, they settled into a comfortable mediocrity and joined the line of succession to what remains essentially normative politics of the benevolent dictatorship.
Today, Vincentian political history successive generations of ‘progressive’ political activists, totally compromised and who are best described as ‘ruminants of the left, and ‘leftovers’.
The labour movement have all but died, with only the Teachers and Public Service Unions, apparently committed to the genuine struggle for the ‘cause’ of Vincentian workers.
The National Youth Council has. Died a pathetic death, signalling the end of an era of aggressive Vincentian youth involvement in issues of the day.
Attempts at creating a National Student Council has met with mixed responses so much so that there is now no effectively representative student voice in the nation.
In 2009, the representative of the nation’s youths on the years’ long Constitution Review body, lamented the absence of their inputs, which they thought were responsive to their consultation with the young people of the country.
2001+
In 2001 the then Opposition Unity Labour Party (ULP) made a concerted effort to garner the youth vote for the general elections. This took the form of a Youth Manifesto, which placed the Caribbean’s foremost road runner, Pamenos Ballantyne, on the cover with a stadium as the backdrop. The message was clear. The appeal for the youth vote was linked to sport.
Analysis of the politics of the ruling party and its government since winning the general elections of 2001, reveals a stark contradiction in what once appeared to have been a ‘political’ promise and the reality.
The government readily changed the name of the National Lottery to the National Lotteries Authority (NLA) but maintained the tagline of the institution being primarily for sport and culture. After 23 years in office, the government is still woefully deficient in providing the Vincentian public with statistical evidence of precisely what amounts of money have been allocated by the NLA to sport and to culture, in any one of the aforementioned years. There has also been no public offering of the criteria that have been used through those 23 years, to determine which individuals and institutions have benefitted from the NLA’s resources.
It came as a surprise to Vincentians a year of two ago when, following the horrible death of a child who should have benefitted from assistance to travel abroad for medical treatment, that NLA funds are also used to contribute to health and even education ‘causes’, although there has been no public accounting of the criteria used to determine either the recipients or the total number of beneficiaries. The NLA is still however being promoted as being for sport and culture.
Since 2000, we have witnessed millions expended on the Arnos Vale Sports Complex, mostly on the prestigious Arnos Vale #1 Playing Field. However, the absence of any scientifically designed administrative and maintenance policy and programme, the facilities have been a ‘financial black hole’ for the country. One has only to analyse the expenditures on these facilities for the Cricket World Cup warm up matches of 2007 and their destruction that led to millions more being required for the T20 Cricket World Cup now in progress.
It is difficult to conceive the justification for the government’s agreement to support this country’s hosting of ‘warm up matches in 2007, a package rejected by Bermuda, and which had no meaningful impact on the outcome of the CWC2007.
For the general elections of 2015, the nation’s youths were fed the announcement that the NLA borrowed $6.5m from the National Insurance Services (NIS) to be used to facilitate upgrades to the nation’s sport infrastructure.
The national stadium that featured so prominently in the Youth Manifesto of 2001, was hastily constructed in 2020 and ‘partially completed for an official opening ceremony on the eve of the general elections of 2020. Work is ongoing, since the project has now gone into phased development.
Many of the nation’s youth, engaged in the popular sport of football, expressed profound disappointment in this country’s response to the overtures of current FIFA president, Gianni Infantino, while the latter visited the national federation. Hopefully, the SVG Football Federation (SVGFF) will be provided the resources needed to purchase its own land and construct its own national state of the art stadium and stave off any dependence on the patronage politics that is normative here.
Enter 2024
We are now in 2024. Vincentian electoral politics have significantly heated up with elections expected in 2024 or 2024. The media is now inundated with what can only be termed ‘elections language’.
The youth vote is again being sought by both political parties. Sport has become a primary object of attention as perhaps the single most important route to garnering the youth vote.
As we are halfway through 2024, we are witnessing a sort of politically motivated economic largesse that could possibly exceed any other period in this nation’s history. However, it remains questionable as to whether the sport largesse is the result of any systemic short-, medium- or long-term development planning that has the future of St Vincent and the Grenadines at its core and the primary response to concerns appears to be, ‘better late than never’.
The facilities now being put in place at Arnos Vales could have been undertaken over time had there been a systematic plan of action in place for its comprehensive development. Instead, the reality appears to be a classic example of what is commonly referred to as ‘vapse’, the absence of any genuine planning exercise.
Already, we are seeing initiatives to engage the nation’s sporting youth in the crafting of new approaches to the role of physical activity and sport in Vincentian life. Vincentian youth, especially the young graduates who would be voting in national elections for the first time, to meticulously examine the current overtures for their engagement, given the heady political campaigning that has started and for which they are prime targets.
Young people must draw important lessons on the revolutionary changes taking place in sport around the world and allow these to positively impact their engagement. The athletes in the NCAA have won in court and many will receive financial rewards for their contributions dating back as far as 10 years in some instances.
Athletes, their coaches and agents are, everywhere, fully engaged in changing sport to facilitate enhanced returns on their investment in the preparation and delivery of historically improving performances and entertainment.
World Athletics has started a major shake-up in the international Olympic Movement, by offering prize monies for athletes in the world’s single biggest, most attractive and financially lucrative sporting spectacle.
Girls and women are today more respected and equally rewarded in sport than at any other time in global sporting history, but still short-changed in many career areas.
Vincentian youth must now see sport as a viable career option, given the ever-expanding array of disciplined merging around the world.
Now is the time to seize the opportunities that abound, everywhere.
Now is the time to be creative with one’s education as sport holds its own.
Vincentian youth, this is your time to apply your critical thinking skills to the forging of your lives, your destiny and your commitment to the future of St Vincent and the Grenadines.
As the Desiderata declares, ‘You have a right to be here!’
