BASSETERRE, ST. KITTS– The present state of the St. Kitts and Nevis Citizenship by Investment Programme is as a result of the negative pronouncements of the Team Unity Government while it was in opposition.
Leader of the Opposition, the Rt. Hon. Dr. Denzil L. Douglas responding to a caller during the first edition of “Ask the Leader” Tuesday on Kyss 102.5 FM said there is need to ventilate in a public discussion all that has been said about the programme by the present government.
“When they were in opposition, they had a different song to sing. They are now in government and to a large extent it is generally viewed in our country and the Caribbean that it is the negative comments that were made by this Team Unity Administration when members of that administration were sitting in opposition. That is why our programme is not doing well at this time,” said Dr. Douglas.
He said the recent CBS-60 Minutes feature on the Citizenship by Investment Programme in the Caribbean would have given the Team Unity Government an opportunity to at least bring to the millions of viewers what the recommendations were when they took office.
“These were recommendations that were being pursued by my St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Party Administration when we left office. They were recommendations that came out of a contractual arrangement with IPSA to study the programme and outline weaknesses and how they can be strengthened and thus move forward,” said Dr. Douglas.
“We do not know why the Team Unity Government did not speak to the matter when others in the Caribbean did,” said Dr. Douglas.
He is of the view “that the Team Unity Government would have been embarrassed that it was commenting on a programme that was using its own language when it was in opposition, speaking negatively about the programme and now in Government found itself with a real dilemma as to how to explain its position then and its position now.”
Dr. Douglas called for full public debate and discussion on the Citizenship by Investment Programme in St. Kitts and Nevis “as to what are the possibilities of its survivability options.”
“Given the attitude of the incoming Trump presidency and what the international press is doing when it speaks to our programmes in the Caribbean and does not speak of the European, British, Canadian and American programmes of similar kind that are presently in operation. I think it is important that we bring this to full debate and discussion.
Callers were of the view that statements by Prime Minister Dr. the Hon. Timothy Harris and the members of his Cabinet hurt the programme when they were in opposition.
Dr. Harris’ famous quote in 2013 likened the granting of St. Kitts and Nevis Economic Citizenship to investors “like selling passports like black pudding on a Saturday.”
