The Leader of SVG Green Party, Warrant Officer Ivan Bertie O’Neal BSc (Hons), MSc, MBA, is making a very strong call for our country to repossess Mustique from the highly questionable ownership by migrants.
In 1959, a lady living in Kingstown, St. Vincent, made a claim that her husband had owned Mustique and had given her Mustique in his will. It is believed that she then ‘sold’ Mustique to one Lord Tennant in 1959 for EC$120,000. There was no deed of sale to say the bloke who died actually owned Mustique in the first place.
The sale/purchase of the Island of Mustique under Deed No. 315 of 1959 and Deed No. 316 of 1959 remains highly questionable, and we contend that the owner of Mustique is in fact the government and people of SVG.
A significant level of obfuscation has occurred within the various sales/purchases of Mustique. After the alleged purchase of Mustique in 1959, Mustique was sold and purchased ‘internally’ twice, firstly to the purchaser’s own estate under Deed no. 650 of 1967 and again on 19 December 1968 under Deed no. 989 of 1968 to try to ‘clean up’ the purchase.
The highly questionable first sale/purchase is the stepping stone for the second phase of colonialism to take root! For example, under the Mustique Act no. 48 of 2002, the present ‘owner’ of Mustique is claiming ownership of the sea around Mustique, and has made it difficult, if not illegal, for local fishing vessels to fish in the sea around Mustique.
This is outrageous and discriminatory. Vincentians who own land bordering the sea are not given the right to ban people from using the sea near their property. Yet, these migrants are and they have not shown any respect for our sovereignty.
It is time to repossess Mustique. Our people deserve prosperity and to be free from oppression driven by this second phase of colonialism, which allows the Mustique migrants to claim tax and customs duty exemptions worth hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
There is no net benefit from having these super-rich migrants in Mustique. They are only interested in providing subordinate employment. They like black people to serve them: cook the food, serve the food, wash the dishes, sweep the floor, make the beds, cut the grass and be their security guard.
The super-rich migrants say they are good for SVG because they hand out money via their charity. This ‘logic’ is a gross insult to the intelligence of Vincentian people. The super-rich migrants of Mustique should pay their hundreds of millions in tax, not hand out peanuts to the poor as if they are some saviour of the people.
Let’s get one thing clear: these super-rich migrants in Mustique have only their own best interests at heart. For decades they have made black Vincentians suffer by withholding hundreds of millions in tax. They are no friend of our people.
This second phase of colonialism must be crushed as Vincentians are becoming second-class citizens in their own country, leaving little hope for our grandchildren. We must repossess Mustique from the highly questionable ownership of the migrants.