Prime Minister Gaston Browne has pledged never to betray the trust of the people of Antigua and Barbuda moments after he was appointed as the country’s prime minister for a historic third consecutive term.
In a post-swearing in interview, PM Browne said he received the message from the people given at the polls held on Wednesday and he is recommitting to working with even more vigor to improve the lives of the people of Antigua and Barbuda.
At Wednesday’s general elections, the Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party scored a razor thin victory by winning nine of the seventeen constituencies.
According to the prime minister there were a number of challenges with which the party had to contend and which may have led to several of his candidates, including four former Cabinet members.
“I want to take this opportunity to recommit to the empowerment of the people of Antigua and Barbuda using all of my intellect, all my energies to promote strategies for their empowerment and to make sure that I never betray their trust,” he declared.
The prime minister said he has an unending love for the people of the country and that he will always work hard on their behalf.
On the closeness of the election results, PM Browne noted that he was aware that a third term for a government was always going to be difficult and that this was compounded by several challenges over which the government had little control. “We had to deal with the escalation of food prices and fuel prices which are issues over which we had no control. This was further compounded by climate change which led to the drying up of our aquifers and other water sources forcing us to embark on a process of acquiring reverse osmosis plants to generate water,” PM Browne stated,
He disclosed that there is one more reverse osmosis plant still to be installed but that too has been delayed due to the logistics issues caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Then he added, was what he termed ‘unrelenting opposition propaganda’ much of which were lies or untruths but which apparently were believed by many of the electorate.
