Do Islamic State jihadists have any dodgy Vincentian passports?

Vincentian passport scandal and Jihad dangers

by Peter Binose, Madrid.

Did they find everyone who had been issued a dodgy Vincentian passport that allowed them to change their name without declaring their previous name? Did they get back every dodgy passport issued?

We don’t know, and may never know exactly what went on with our passports.

The batch of unissued dodgy passports were said to have been burnt and destroyed, once they were destroyed it became impossible to audit the numbers burnt against the number acquired by the government, were any missing and how many were actually claimed to be officially issued? Were any unofficially issued? With the passports burnt we will never know. The evidence has been destroyed.

There are lots of Cubans here in SVG, about 300 immigrants who have residency and work permits, who are able to work and have jobs that Vincentians should have, and they are not part of the 300 working at the Argyle Airport. Some Cubans have been given honoree citizenship, why? You must ask PM Gonsalves that question, also ask him if any of them were issued with those dodgy passports that allowed them to enter the US and Canada as Vincentian citizens with no reference to their previous citizenship and birthplace in Cuba? Is that possible? Is that a true case scenario? We have seen Iranians who are said to have Vincentian citizenship, were any Iranians issued with those same dodgy passports?   If any of that went on, how do we know that passports have not been issued to members of ISIS, allowing them to enter the US and Canada undetected.

“The burning of those passports was little less than a criminal act;

it’s no wonder that Canada withdrew the right for Vincentians to enter Canada without a Visa.”

Now it has been announced that the Europeans are about to sign an agreement with some Caribbean countries, that includes SVG. The agreement is called the ‘Schengen Visa Waiver Agreement’ it allows our nationals to enter and travel freely through European Union States. Has anyone told the Europeans about the dodgy passport past and how we are now required to have a Visa to enter Canada? Has anyone told the Europeans that our women are so badly beaten and ritually raped, that when they get to Europe many will be claiming asylum? In 2010, our women ranked 8th in the world for refugee claims to Canada. Has anyone told the EU that the US identified an Iranian special agent as a Vincentian duel citizen? An Iranian who has been laundering billions of dollars for the Iranian government, in doing so circumventing the US sanctions. Because by not telling the Europeans it’s like withholding evidence, it’s like telling the worst possible lie. You can be sure it will come back and bite us in the bum. I am therefore honor bound to send a copy of this letter to the EU tonight. 

Peter Binose: Mendacious Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves

PM Ralph Gonsalves

Whilst talking with an old friend in Dublin recently we were discussing Prime Minister Gonsalves.

For this letter I will describe my friend as Paddy. That’s not his name, nothing like his name, but will hide his persona from any collective spite that may just be gathered against him after this little tête-à-tête.

He follows both the printed news and the online news very carefully regarding Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. As a child his parents were posted in SVG and he has holidayed there a thousand times since becoming a man. He loves our little country and has fond memories of us as a people, our verdant island and the beauty of the white sanded Grenadine pearl necklace of islands.

The discussion that started with old times eventually got around to what is happening today. He is so disappointed in what he reads about the political situation under the leadership of Dr Gonsalves and his Unity Labour Party.  

Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves lied about Argyle International Airport

When you lie to the Business Investors you ‘Own the lies’ when it all goes wrong

by Peter Binose

When Ralph Gonsalves announced the finish and operational dates for the Argyle International Airport, we must ask ourselves if he knew each of those dates was unachievable. I like many others believe he did know that the completion dates he gave us were not just unachievable, he knew that such statements were downright lies.

When you tell lies sooner or later your very own lies will come back and bite you in the arse, as the old folk would say.

Saying the airport would definitely be up and running by 2011 may very well have caused all sorts of business people who were ardent followers of Gonsalves, to invest money in their business’s to take advantage of the upswing in trade that the same Gonsalves claimed would follow the airport opening.

He also told the people that he would build a city on the Arnos Vale site when the air traffic was transferred to Argyle. He said the new city would be linked to the old city of Kingstown by a four lane tunnel under the hill, it doesn’t matter that approaching the tunnel from either end it would only be one lane. The whole matter was embroidered to wind the business people into spending money.

Hotels in Villa who are ULP supporters have invested fortunes in upgrading their family owned hotels in anticipation of the Gonsalves forecast of a huge surge in stop over’s and business in general.

People like Ken Boyer borrowed money from banks to build his supermarket and Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet, why? because as a cousin to Gonsalves he believed that Gonsalves would finish the airport by 2011 and the new city would be finished five years after that in 2016. Ken was a little silly because he should have known better than most of Gonsalves ability to make things up, to embroider the truth and make it into blatant lies.

The Harlequin Buccament Bay Project based all its plans on the airport opening in 2011, they have also been shafted and they must be seriously in danger of folding because the airport is the key to much of their projected business. They were made promises and are now suffering from lies.

Venezuela Declares Right to fly Warplanes over sovereign Caribbean Islands

by Peter Binose

In a speech on national television, Venezuela’s president Maduro reports that the air defense areas of the country have been expanded beyond the Windward Islands all the way up to St Maarten. President Nicolas Maduro, said that his country has the right to defend itself in the skies above the Dutch Antilles.

Venezuela is already a bully of the seas claiming areas that it does not own, now it appears they are trying to bully the airspace.

We have to remember how PM Ralph Gonsalves supported Venezuela’s sea grab of Bird Island. Just what kind of betrayal was that?

The yellow area shows the Venezuelan Economic space, with the effect of Aves Island/Rock.

Under the International Law Of The Sea Aves Island is classified as a rock which does not get the 200mile economic zone, however Venezuela hasn’t signed the UNLOS treaty. This rock effectively removes a significantly removes most of the OECS’ economic zone.

… from Notes from the Margin article How Venezuela Controls the Caribbean Sea

“St Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr Ralph Gonsalves said the OECS had accepted Venezuela’s sovereignty over Bird Island and that he would not allow anyone to dictate whether or not he should put pressure on the Government of Venezuela in relation to the issue”. Speaking at a press conference at the Caricom secretariat, Gonsalves said, “Nobody is going to tell me which questions are important.”

When public support for this type of Venezuelan communist regime wanes at home they try and turn public attention from local matters to the international theatre.  

A river runs through it… Argyle Airport runway, that is!

Yambou River and mud in the middle of Argyle Airport runway

submitted by the SVG Green Party

If anyone tells you that aircraft will land at Argyle in 2015, then that person is lying to you. The middle of the Argyle airport runway is a river and a muddy wasteland. The Argyle airport will take at least four more years, and even then, it will not be a functioning airport.

Since 2006, we have been bombarded with ULP regime nonsense about how the Argyle airport will boost the economy, but the reality is Argyle has been a curse to our country. Throughout SVG, towns, villages and communities have been starved of jobs and money, all for the sake of building Argyle airport for tourists.

From Fancy to Fitzhughes, Union Island and beyond, the needs of Vincentians have been ignored. Hospitals have fallen to ruin, the economy is virtually dead and the country is littered with tombs that once used to be flourishing businesses. The consequence has been high unemployment, high crime, destitution and poverty.
Vincentians have been made to suffer under the economic delusion that tourism and the Argyle Airport will bring prosperity. Well, they will not.

Having an airport does not guarantee prosperity. Barbados has had an international airport since 1938 and tourism for over 60 years, yet Barbados laid-off 3,000 government workers in 2013 and rolled out yet another national poverty alleviation programme a few years previous.

We have been lied to time and again, being told that Argyle airport will be finished in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015. One need only look at the muddy mess at Argyle to know that it will not be finished in 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 or 2019.

The Yambou River is yet to be culverted; there is a mountain of mud in the middle of the runway area; the northern end of the runway is just mud and is being washed away by the sea; and, the cliff at Peruvian Vale village impedes final approach to the runway and will need to be knocked down and cleared away. 

The Bridges of St. Vincent: Unnecessary deaths and destruction likely to continue.

Christmas 2013: Body bags are the natural result of building on flood plains and failing to clear bridge obstructions.

The future is as dark as the silt-laden waters

by Peter Binose

(Photo courtesy of I-Witness News)

The 3rd Duke of Bridgewater and perhaps even Isambard Kingdom Brunel would turn in their graves if they could see how the Unity Labour Party have neglected our little island’s waterways and bridges to the extent that bridges are destroyed on a regular basis.

It’s ever so simple to comprehend really – streams, rivers and tributaries have to be kept clear of obstructions and siltation on a very regular basis. If this procedure is neglected even for one season,  flooding will ensue which will cause river bank and bridge damage, if not total loss of bridges. Everyone with half a brain knows that, but obviously not the ULP leadership.

Over the last fourteen years just about every bridge on our tiny island of Saint Vincent has suffered serious damage. The rivers are allowed to collect tree trunks and roots and other debris and rubbish without regular round the year maintenance and clearance by teams of work men clearing and burning such vegetation waste. When it rains heavy this debris floats down river and blocks under bridges.

Of course the silt level under bridges is allowed to grow to such an extent that between the debris and the silt, an effective dam is created.

When the silt and debris effectively blocks the water flow under the bridge the water builds up to an enormous pressure that damages the bridge and attached road. The sudden release of a large volume of water rushes down river taking with it the next bridge, if there is one, where the bridge dam sequence and sudden release is repeated on a magnified basis, also taking river banks on its way. Eventually this torrent overflows into the ancient flood plains as has happened for hundreds of thousands of years. 

Secret Duty Free Bribery in St. Vincent and the Grenadines

Some animals ARE more equal than others

by Piotr “Petya” Byskovhoc

I worked for an American Corporation in the Soviet Union Russian city of  Moscow  ‘Москва’  during the late 1970’s.  I enjoyed my stay there but the people were diabolically racist towards black people. Muscovite men and women, typically imbued with neo-Nazi beliefs about Jews, blacks, and all other foreign racial groups of people and others, were also notoriously wicked, and the murder of such people on the streets of Moscow was common place.

Their society ran on the principal of reporting friends and neighbors to the authorities, the KGB,  when anyone did or spoke anything which was regarded anti Soviet or Anti Communist Party. It was a frightening system and fear was a useful tool to the Soviet authorities. It’s very much a system that has been introduced to Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.  Just looking at Bigger Biggs and Marcus De Freitus and numerous other groups and individuals shows what is happening.  

St. Vincent and the Grenadines Bailey bridges a showcase of SVG government incompetence

Above: Washington State erects a Bailey Bridge in 3 days!

by Peter Binose

Let’s get one thing straight, the Bailey bridges are a ULP election propaganda project. Why on earth would we need a ceremony to celebrate the start of installing three temporary bridges, why? Because that is what they are: temporary, bolt together structures, they are not meant to be permanent.

There is currently a battalion of Ecuadorian Army Corps of Engineers posted in St Vincent [3×16 men platoons and three officers make a 48-man battalion]. That’s the official number according to reports posted in St Vincent’s media. Yet only 25 Ecuadorian goosestep-marching soldiers paraded in our so called independence day celebrations. Perhaps 48 goosing Ecuadorians would have been nice for the ladies, but would have been a little intimidating for the spectators — 48 foreigners goose-stepping in the park named after and gifted to us by Queen Victoria: Victoria Park.

We need to examine the Bailey bridges being installed and exactly what a Bailey bridge is. A Bailey bridge is a temporary structure that is used during an emergency to temporarily substitute a previously built bridge that was destroyed by flood or war activities. The bridge simply bolts together in sections, like a toy ‘Meccano set’ or even a jigsaw puzzle. The British Army has been known to assemble one of these bridges overnight. But the normal time during an emergency installation is one week for 35 men plus three engineers to install an 80-foot span. See this YouTube video.

We have had the bridges for six months; they could have been assembled and installed months ago, so why wait for the election time to come before bringing in the troops? 

Government corruption in St. Vincent – remembering the Ruben Morgan cocaine smuggling affair

SVG Attorney General Judith Jones-Morgan

Remember the case of the man Ruben Morgan, a relative of Attorney General Judith Jones-Morgan? He was given a diplomatic passport in 2001. He was not a Vincentian diplomat, he did not work for the government, yet he was given a diplomatic passport.

In 2004, he was travelling to a family affair in the UK. Judith Jones-Morgan was travelling to the same family affair, but on a different flight. Ruben Morgan was caught at a London airport carrying one kilo of cocaine. Because he was travelling on an SVG diplomatic passport he was sent packing back to SVG. A kilo of cocaine in the UK usually earns you a ten to twenty year jail sentence. The man had a Canadian passport and a normal Vincentian passport, but he chose to travel on his SVG diplomatic passport. When he got back to SVG he was not charged here for anything. He went scot-free, no charges were brought.

That in mind and in my opinion was a blatant case of perverting the course of justice. Perhaps the people who arranged for, and gave him such a right to have a diplomatic passport should also have been charged.

These things are being done on a regular basis, why are the done? Because they know they can do it and no Vincentian will lift a finger or complain. They know that no other country is going to reprimand them. They know that, if they prosecute and lock up their supporters and those they identify as the ULP family, just about the whole ULP party membership, perhaps much of the judiciary will be in clink, in prison. They know that once they let those people off the crime, those people will owe their minds and souls to the party and its dirty leadership.

For more stories of SVG government corruption see the latest from Peter Binose Once upon a crime in St Vincent and the Grenadines

Bearer shares: a wonderful tool of corruption for Caribbean political elites!

Could A Family of Crooks Get Control of a Small Caribbean Island Government?

by Peter Binose

Lets play a game of pretend and once upon a time…

Once upon a time there were a family of crooks who got control of a government of a small island state. They knew they would not be in power for ever so they needed to devise a way of stealing [teefing] alot and stealing it quickly. One of those involved was a bent ex-bank employee, and had what some of his partners in the scheme would describe as a  brain wave, or even a masterstroke idea.

The initial idea was to control the government treasury and to start almost immediately in their first term to issue government Treasury Bills. The bills would need to be issued every month and plenty of them on a regular basis. The bills would give a compounded interest discounted up front equal to 24% per annum. They would not buy all the bills, allowing the market to buy the majority, thus not raising suspicions.

The problem so far had been getting elected and that was soon sorted – they got elected by foul and unfair means. A few promises of lining the pocket forever of a bent politician from another political party, even perhaps a Knighthood… how could he refuse? Even down to the employment of his children and family in high flying and high paying jobs.

Next was to decide on how to structure the state rip off. It was decided to make it a family affair whereby just a handful or perhaps only two or three knew the truth… 

Leon “Bigger Biggs” Samuels still enduring spiteful attacks by SVG government

Above: Businessman Samuels protests his illegal arrest

“ULP members must learn that supporting your political party when they are inflicting wrong on any citizen is an acceptance and involvement in an evil act on your part. You are as evil as the inflictors. You must speak out. It is the obligation of any decent human being to do so.”

by Peter Binose

Mr Leon “Bigger Biggs” Samuels was in most people’s minds attacked and his business destroyed because he ceased supporting the ruling political party, the Unity Labour Party [ULP]. His changed support from ULP to NDP in the 2010 elections brought wrath, spite, hatred, malice from the ULP government two months later in 2011 – which turned out to be pure evil hatred poured upon him, his family and his work force.

“There were no boundaries considered in the destruction of the Bigger Biggs Enterprise, the man, all those around and connected to him, and his company.”

Bigger Biggs claims that the original reasons for cancelling his operator’s license to mine his land at Rabacca were  magnified out of reality. I believe they were trumped up by  government ministers in several ministerial meetings. His very words were, and still are “the government claims are bogus.”

Now after returning his license on his birthday last week – a license that supposedly sat on the desk of the Attorney General for three months, a license that has taken over three years to be returned or reinstated – the license is still worthless and unacceptable in terms and content. A week after delivering the license, the unelected family regime Senator says there are now new terms demanded by the government which affect his rights and ownership. Also that the license must be ratified by the Cabinet.

One of those being the claim that some of the land now claimed by Bigger Biggs is government owned. I believe that they are referring to the addition of land to that of Bigger Biggs adjacent to the river, an addition brought about by nature  [Avulsion].

“The amazing thing about “Bigger Biggs” is that he has remained a gentleman throughout the whole matter.”

Government favours Taiwanese over citizens

I write the following from British law, I hope it also applies to SVG…

I believe that the river bed and the water in the river is under the control of the government for protective reasons, not for commercial reasons, not for the extraction of income. Despite the governments control of the river banks and the bed of the river, the river bed, soil or ground there-under is owned by the adjacent land owners and is known as riparian ownership. If the river moves and land is added to the adjacent land owner, it remains the property of the adjacent land owner, not the government. 

House collapse disaster in St. Vincent a predictable result of Government negligence and corruption

The ULP’s  Electioneering Housing Scheme Hits a Slippery Slope.

Homes at Clare Valley are now blighted and worthless.

by Peter Binose

When you have evil in your heart you can almost be certain things will inevitably go wrong – the Karma will get you. That’s what has happened, and that’s the basis of the ULP housing schemes. The ULP like to describe them as a “government” housing schemes, but that is not true. They are schemes designed by a political party that is in a position of power – to build houses for their own supporters in areas where the party needs to boost their voting electorate. It is no more and no less than that.

It’s an attempt to move whole swathes of supporters into areas where the ULP have low support. It’s the old British Labour Party style of increasing votes where the party needs votes to get elected. This is a practice invented by the British Labour Party government in the early days when nasty Marxist types and other little red devils ruled the country.

“The ULP had the brilliant idea of acquiring rock-bottom priced land and giving it to political supporters.

Of course these lands had no value because they were problem lands – extreme slopes with soil problems that made construction a dangerous proposition…”

In 1951 the British Labour Party established a scientific socialist revolution and planned to build council houses in the UK for rent and sale in areas that traditionally had low socialist support. They went to pretty little towns and villages of a few hundred or a few thousand people and supplanted a populace that greatly exceeded that of the original people count – sometimes by more than double.

That is exactly what the ULP government wants to do: plant and install large numbers of people in housing projects in areas where they previously could not get elected. But to do that they must ensure that those who take the houses are grateful to the party and will vote for them come hell or high water. This cannot be a fair government policy; it can only be a party political policy dressed as a government giveaway scheme that benefits a certain section of the populace and excludes others.

St. Vincent’s Argyle Airport runway test procedures raise serious doubts

(click photo for larger)

Terminal is 30 feet below runway level

by Peter Binose

I have visited the airport three times every week during the last two months.  Recently I watched with my new ‘Sunagor 30- 160X70 binoculars’ from the base of the control tower site, a man I know as a Cuban engineer assisted by a Vincentian labourer testing the runway compaction.

Instead of making a grid in the process of analysing the runway compaction test scientifically it was more of a willy-nilly kind of testing regime.

St. Vincent & The Grenadines tables a Bill to make corruption legal!

“All  actions by the Passport Officer in relation to the issuing of a passport and the charging and collecting of fees which were validated by subsections (1) and (2) respectively are validated and declared to have been lawful and the Passport Officer and every person acting on behalf of the Passport Officer are freed, acquitted, discharged and indemnified as well against the Queen’s Most Gracious Majesty, Her Heirs and Successors as against all other persons from all proceedings of any kind in respect of or consequent on any such actions.”

… all selling of citizenships and passports in the past is forgiven! (Amendments to law before Parliament on Monday June 2, 2014)

Passports and Citizenships for Sale – Get ’em while they are hot!

by Peter Binose

Has someone done something wrong that the ULP government want to bum rush this disgusting piece of legislation through Parliament? Whose arse are they trying to save? Is this an Act to make corruption legal?

What it say’s is that the passports issued in New York and elsewhere for inflated sums of money, those involved will now be reciprocally pardoned from any crime or wrong doing. Yes its an act to make past mal practice legal and non-actionable.

The question I ask, was any family member of the ruling party government involved in past passport renewal? New York, Washington? What happened?

Here ya go!

SAINT  VINCENT  AND THE GRENADINES BILL
FOR  ACT NO                                OF  2014
ASSENT

AN ACT to amend the Passport Act, Chapter 115.

BE IT ENACTED by the Queen’s Most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the House of Assembly of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and by the authority of the same, as follows:

Stop building on Buccament Bay flood plain – Death is coming again

Ricky Small cries for his dear wife Joselle, who was taken by the raging waters at Buccament Bay Resort.

by Peter Binose

The private housing development along the Buccament River, in fact beside the Buccament river in the flood plain, was going full speed when I visited last week. Express work is taking place on finishing about a dozen further units, with all stages in progress from start up on.

I walked with a family member of the land owners and builders, who told me the family is worried that they may be stopped from building. But he thought perhaps because of the relationship between them and the ULP leadership they had some considerable protection.

Considering the devastation caused by the December 2013 flooding it is unbelievable, perhaps even criminal, that the government has not stopped further building in an area which has been recorded as a disaster zone for centuries. The area is an ancient and modern floodplain, as shown by the follow records going back to 1876! 

SVG High Court Registrar resigns suddenly – rumours flying about Harlequin connection

File this under “Breaking News… or Rumour?”

I-Witness News in St. Vincent and the Grenadines is reporting that the High Court Registrar (Tamara Marks) didn’t show up for work this morning (Friday 23 May 2014), and that she resigned.

BFP’s own source says it is rumour at the court that it has something to do with the Harlequin mess. Take that with a big chunk of sea salt, okay?

Registrar Tamara Marks is wife of former senator for the ruling Unity Labour Party, lawyer Ronald “Ronnie” Marks, who was himself arrested in 2013 in New York City for assaulting a police officer. Those charges were thrown out of court and Marks said he would sue the NYPD.

Harlequin Buccament Bay flood deaths caused by neglect, dereliction of duty?

“Seeing as the government knew about the need to carry out river flood protection, why did they give Harlequin’s Buccament Bay Resort permission to build in a known flood plain on a river that required river bank flood defences installed?

Why did they approve of building private houses in a flood plain, next to a dangerous river requiring bank and river base restructuring and defences?

Why? Why? Can they tell us Why?

Why did they fail to install those defences?”

by Peter Binose

(Photo courtesy of I-Witness News)

Whilst researching the Christmas Buccament floods I discovered that both Ralph Gonsalves and Julian Francis as government ministers were both informed as early as 2001 that Buccament was likely to flood. They were instructed to carry out urgent river defenses but almost every year for about 13 years just got more and more reports on the matter. They had the reports done because the World Bank was paying for the reports, they cost us nothing. But after getting the reports they failed to act – and that failure to act proved to be fatal  for a number of people.

In some of the reports it is even quoted that Buccament is in a flood plain. As such they allowed new building in a flood plain next to a river that was almost certainly going to flood, and it did.

PM Ralph Gonsalves

Remember the videos of Gonsalves walking through Buccament with tears in his eyes? Was that all an act? He must of been terrified that the people would find out that he was pre-warned and failed to act, thus being a direct contributor to the loss of all those poor people.

The piece below is something I have submitted to all the newspapers and online publications. We will have see if the SVG newspapers have the courage to publish what I have written, regardless of the fact that its all verifiable as the truth.

Buccament Bay flood deaths neglect, dereliction of duty or something worse?

On December 24 and 25, 2013, Saint Vincent & the Grenadines was hit by a low-level, high-impact trough system which caused severe infrastructure damage to the country. The trough brought high winds, torrential rains and floods. Local rainfall stations reported between 200mm and 310mm on the windward side of the island and 153.3mm in the leeward side of the island.

As a result of the disaster event, there were 11 confirmed deaths and 3 persons were never found. The final disaster assessment concluded: 77 homes were completely destroyed or severely damaged; approximately another 300 homes were damaged; and 500 people were displaced and housed in temporary shelters.

Since their first year in power there is unequivocal evidence that the Unity Labour Party [ULP] government have been fully aware of the vulnerability to serious flooding at Buccament and in other places. They were aware that Buccament is generally a flood plain area.  Their studies from 2001 to 2014 show just that. They have had thirteen years to put river defenses in at Buccament, but failed to do so. The Christmas 2013 Buccament flood tragedy occurred and lives were lost.

For thirteen years the government had dragged their feet and carried out numerous studies for Social Assessment Disaster Vulnerability Reduction Projects, at Buccament and elsewhere.

Here are some of the official references to studies regarding the flooding danger from Buccament river. From them it is most obvious that the government were fully aware of the dangers of doing nothing. 

St. Vincent Prime Minister says he does Obeah sorcery for the Lord

“I only work Obeah for the Lord”

SVG Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves

by Peter Binose

These words were recorded as spoken by Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves in parliament, “I only work Obeah for the Lord”. What an insult to the Vincentian Christian society. How on earth can a prime minister in a Christian country say such a thing, and never apologise?

According to Wikipedia, Obeah (sometimes spelled Obi, Obea or Obia) is a term used in the West Indies to refer to folk magic, sorcery, and religious practices derived from West African, and specifically Igbo origin. Obeah is similar to other African derived religions including Palo, Voodoo, Santeria, rootwork, and most of all hoodoo.

Obeah is associated with both benign and malignant magic, charms, luck, and with mysticism in general. In some Caribbean nations, Obeah refers to folk religions of the African diaspora. In some cases, aspects of these folk religions have survived through syncretism with Christian symbolism and practice introduced by European colonials and slave owners. Casual observation may conclude that Christian symbolism is incorporated into Obeah worship, but in fact may represent clandestine worship and religious protest.

During slavery, Obeah was directed against the European slave masters. However, with the rise of Christianity, Obeah is considered taboo, and the term has pejorative associations.

Which ‘Lord’ is PM Gonsalves referring to?

Obeah is practiced in Suriname, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Dominica, Guyana, Barbados, Grenada, Belize, The Bahamas and now according to Dr Ralph E. Gonsalves in St Vincent, and other Caribbean countries. Gonsalves said in parliament, “I only do Obeah for the Lord.” It’s true he said that, and it’s recorded in parliamentary records.

Such a statement must be an insult to Christians. Gonsalves told us he only does Obeah for the Lord. My argument is that you cannot do Obeah for God or Lord Jesus. So who is Gonsalves referring to, could it be ‘The Lord of Darkness, Satan‘?