May 25, 2021

PM Faces Backlash For Attributing Covid Spike To Candlelight Vigils

By Newsroom

Opposition Leader Kamla Persad Bissessar has voiced upset over Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley’s statement that candlelight vigils held earlier this year contributed to a spike in Covid-19 cases, calling it another game of casting blame. 

Dr. Rowley made the comment as he moved a Motion in the House of Representatives on Monday, highlighting the Opposition’s role in supporting vigils across the country in February.

“The only country, in the Caribbean, where in the middle of a pandemic, the Opposition organize gatherings of people called vigils. Thousands of people for a month trying to exploit the death of Andrea Bharatt and you asking me how we got here. “What other gatherings took place?” Dr. Rowley told the Parliament. 

In a statement on Tuesday, Persad-Bissessar described the reasoning as a cop-out to what she said was government’s failure to properly manage the pandemic.

“The UNC commiserates  with all the families who were affected by violent crimes.  In their time of healing, they should not have to face the wickedness of a Prime Minister who in order to save face and deflect from the failures of himself and his government, resorts to another blame game, this time blaming vigils held for  loved ones,” she said. 

Also condemning the PM’s comments was the Candlelight Movement, led by political leader of the Progressive Empowerment Party.

“It is unfortunate that the scapegoat selected by the PM is groups which sought, through peaceful vigils to highlight the outrage and desperation of citizens regarding the untenable situation of crime and violence against women… Vigils began following the brutalization and murder of another innocent young girl, 18 year old Ashanti Riley in December, 2020 and have continued not only for Ashanti Riley and Andrea Bharatt, but the countless victims of crime in our country, many of whose names have long been forgotten,” the organization said. 

 

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