By:Erasmus Williams
Basseterre, St. Kitts, January 1, 2018 – Leader of the Opposition The Right Hon. Dr. Denzil L. Douglas has described 2017 as “a certainly a year to remember.”
In his 2018 New Year message, the former prime minister remembered the people of the islands of Anguilla, Barbuda, Dominica, the British Virgin Islands, the United States Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico and the Turks and Caicos Islands who were devastated by the two most powerful hurricanes in living memory.
“For most of us, it was not an uneventful year. Indeed, some of us underwent serious changes unlike any we had ever seen or experienced before. It was a year of disruptions in so many ways. Though our Federation was spared the full onslaughts of Hurricanes Irma and Maria, many of us recorded financial losses as our properties still sustained serious damage. Even now, some of us are still grappling with the challenges of the cost of repairs and in some instances, the total replacement of irreparable commodities,” said Dr. Douglas.
The former prime minister said that despite the difficulties brought by both storms, “we (St. Kitts and Nevis) can lift our hands to the heavens, thankful that lives were not lost. Always remember that things can be repaired or replaced, but a lost life is gone forever.”
Pointing to the resulting chaos, devastation, and trauma other Caribbean neighbours endured from the passage of these two fierce storms, Dr. Douglas said: “we continue to empathise with them even as we recognise how the mighty hand of God protected us. We lift our hearts in praise to the Almighty.”