ANTIGUA | The High Cost of Dissent: When Fear of Consequences Muzzles Cabinet

ST. JOHN'S, Antigua, May 23, 2025 - D.Gisele Isaac | We used to wonder how a Cabinet comprised of big, hardbacked men, almost exclusively, could sit silently and just allow the excesses of their chairman as head of Government?

We used to marvel that none had the commonsense to discreetly tug his jacket (imperiled button notwithstanding) and say, “Take it easy, Man.” (Of course, we had no such expectations of the lone female.)

But last week’s sitting of the Lower House provided a definitive answer: When a man’s delicate orbs sit uncomfortably in the palm of his superior, even a murmur of dissent could have crushing consequences.

And that’s the word for today, Folks: “consequences.” 

I listened, last week, with amazement as the prime minister used parliamentary immunity to utter what I believe to be a self-concocted untruth, alleging collusion in the recent industrial action between the leadership of the Teachers Union and senior figures in the United Progressive Party.

(After some thought, I remembered that such claims were just par for the course, as, previously, he’d uttered such foolishness about the staff at the APUA  before chopping and replacing heads. And I chortled when recalling he had just written off those very replacements as “jokey” only the other day.)

But what gave me pause were his remarks to Education Minister Daryll Matthew who, he claimed, had heard the same fiction about collusion. In short, the prime minister reminded this adult man,  who had come into the House through the same door he, himself, had entered – the ballot box, no matter how many voters had been transferred out and in – that he was his “subordinate.” 

And using that ultimate caution, the prime minister assured the minister that any digression from the story he had established would have no consequences.

Really? Anybody who expected the minister to disagree or subtract from the prime minister’s story after that, please say “Aye!”   Ok. I believe the silent majority has it….

I’m reminded of an old TV commercial in the United States in which the proprietor of a business announced: “The girls in my shop know one thing: This is MY shop, and when I want their opinion I’ll give it to them.  Right, Girls?” To which the staff all joyfully responded: “Right!”

But seriously, Folks: Where, in Parliament, where ALL the members are equal – Opposition MPs included – does the Member for St. John’s City West get off calling anyone his “subordinate?” If that is not unbecoming and unparliamentary language I don’t know what is.  Threatening language, maybe?

I couldn’t help but wonder what the minister of education possibly could have done to deserve such a public demerit.  But then I cast my mind back to the snarling, “Don’t contradict me,” uttered when another hapless minister attempted to soften the declaration that constituencies that hadn’t voted for the Antigua Labour Party would be pushed to the back of the services line.  And I concluded that this is just the nature of the City West MP.

However, when that MP continued with a statement about alumni supporting their education institutions, and declared that while he is willing to contribute $100 a month, his Rural South colleague could spare the sum of $1,000, I said, “Tarl!  Subbm funny here.”

This, my fellow patriots, is how we have gotten to the point where the sitting administration does nothing but sit, while one rogue parliamentarian runs the yacht of State aground.  Because when the ministers’ financial future sits in the same palm as those delicate body parts, what you are guaranteed to get is a crew of “yes-men.”

Come on! It’s an open secret whoever is building, buying, or acquiring whatever in this 2x4 country.  And when anyone in the charmed circle appears to be getting too rich or too independent and fails to genuflect  when the boss walks by, he or she could lose bat, ball, and building at one go.

And how does it happen?  The victim is outed in public first – to have his supporters look askance at him and ask how he’s gotten so rich since getting into office – and then, if the recalcitrance continues, that  palm pouch closes into a fist.  Ouch!

Now, with more than a decade of the self-enrichment ethos and edict, can you imagine how much one has to lose?  Well, multiply that by 10 other Cabinet members, and you will understand that what is at stake here is almost the value of the Nation’s GDP in lands, buildings, commercial vehicles, shares and partnerships, and other perks. 

You think they’re going to risk all that just to stand up for us, in Parliament, in Cabinet, on the platform, or in the boardroom?  I think the “No’s” have it here, with no abstentions, don’t you?

So the next time you read a ridiculous Cabinet Note, like the planting of fruit trees along the roadways that are supposed to be dug up for rehabilitation; or hear the prime minister say he is going to build roads like he has no sense (well, at least half of that is true); or hear quips about roads being smooth like babies’ bottoms, do not wonder how the Cabinet members and ministers keep a straight face. 

Just picture where those orbs are resting and know they have no choice but to “nod and smile,” as the script directs.

After all, the man has already stated, in plain English, that no party convention is necessary, because no one would dare raise a head against him – and, clearly, the “subordinates” have all agreed.

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