By Vivian Tyson- SUN Senior Editor
Former Deputy Premier Lillian Boyce says British direct rule was not in the best interest of the Turks and Caicos Islands, since they were not looking out for the benefit of the people of this country, but for themselves.
Therefore, she urged the young people to make themselves available for service to their country, so that the British would never again take what was rightfully theirs.
“Every one of our young people who have the ambition to enter politics, you should go forth and do it. Go and serve your country. Make that important contribution, so that they (British) cannot keep on bringing in these old, lazy, good for nothing, baldheaded, grey haired British People, who are sleeping on the job. You, Young people, who we are educated, take your position in our country because we certainly don’t need them to push papers,” Boyce said during a Progressive National Party rally on Friday night, March 30, at the PNP headquarters along Airport Road in Providenciales.
She said that the PNP trumped the Interim Administration on education at all levels, the management of the economy and human rights as a whole, and as such, there was no comparison between the two administrations.
“When we were the government, the PNP, and of course the PDM- because I prefer to have an elected government any day than this British colonial party – we cared about education. Now, hundreds of children are on the streets not being educated. Whether they are our nationality or whether they are our Caribbean brothers and sisters, it is important for our children, any children living our country, to be educated. Under an elected government, you know that we would educate our children from early childhood education to tertiary level. We have thousands of educated people today because of the education policy that we, as a government, had,” Boyce said.
On the matter of investment, Boyce said that the former PNP administration, through its policies, modernized the Turks and Caicos. She said however, that the British Government was planning to decimate all that was achieved.
“I sometimes wonder what would really happen if the international media would just take for a moment and find out what is happening in the Turks and Caicos. Many of you who had a piece of land to build your dream home or just to build a home, today you can’t even afford it. They have raised the price above affordability. Those of you whose children have finished college, the community college or high school, at least three years ago are here unemployed,” she said.
Boyce also lamented the massive cut in the civil service, which she said was designed to leave many on the street jobless in a shrinking economy.
She charged that a number of locals who had been axed from the civil service were frustrated out of their jobs by the Interim Administration, who wanted to replace them with UK workers.
“We have Dr. Ewing here, and Sonia Williams, who used to be my undersecretary in Education (Ministry); we have many other Turks and Caicos Islanders, who spent their last day in the civil service today (Friday, March 30), simply because the Brits want to push them out to bring in their lazy, good for nothing people, to go up on Grace Bay Beach to cool out; to live in big time hotels and cool out on our beach.
“Of course we have some Turks and Caicos Islanders, who love to lick, lick, lick (sell-out their own at any cost), but I am happy that people like Dr. Ewing and Sonia Williams told them to ‘go to hell’; ‘give me my package’ or ‘I resign’; ‘I will definitely go and serve my country’, ” Boyce noted.
Boyce said that she was happy that the rally attracted not only PNP supporters but also PDM sympathizers. Among the members of the audience was the PDM’s Secretary General Ewonka Selver.
CAPTION: Lillian Boyce delivers her speak at the PNP Rally
published in SUNTCI