STATEMENT FROM THE ST. KITTS-NEVIS LABOUR PARTY ON THE DOUBLE HOMICIDE IN KEYS VILLAGE ON THURSDAY 1ST MARCH, 2018

The St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Party is both heartbroken and deeply disturbed by the recent double homicide of two of our nation’s young and upcoming women, Jemilia and Jemisha Finch. Both women, sisters, had their lives unjustly cut short earlier this week. One of them was not only a soldier in the Royal St. Christopher and Nevis Defence Force, but also a young mother of a two-month old baby.

For more than a year, the Labour Party has been beseeching the powers that be in our Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis as well as key stakeholders in our society to pay special attention to the very blatant increase in the perpetuation of crimes against our womenfolk. Almost monthly, we hear multiple saddening and frightening reports of women being robbed and raped in their homes and on our streets. The first murder victim for 2018 was also a woman on Nevis.

An increase in crimes against women is a clear tell-tale signal that not only are various social controls in a severe state of failure, but also that there is systematic failure throughout numerous sectors of our society and country on a whole.

This most recent act of extreme violence against these two women stands as gut-wrenching testimony to all of St. Kitts and Nevis that coursing through our country is a new and criminal form of social dispensation. Such a perversion threatens to eviscerate our societies and thus, cannot be allowed to further strengthen. Hence we must stand together as a country and fight for its eradication.

The Labour Party is admonishing our nation’s key stakeholders and social influencers to live up to our nation’s motto of “Country Above Self”. We must come together as a people and a nation in order to defeat this scourge. The laying of blame at the feet of those in power whose poor examples have been set and duly followed by misguided members of society will not suffice; the country needs leadership, particularly in this regard, or we shall all perish by the twos and threes.

The St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Party wishes to express heartfelt condolences to the families of Jemilia and Jemisha Finch on this most painful loss. Our thoughts and prayers are with you at this time, as is our support through your time of bereavement.