DLP: BLP road repairs, EV buses ‘for show’

Democratic Labour Party (DLP) candidate for Christ Church East, Amoy Gilding-Bourne, accused the current administration of neglecting critical infrastructure and agricultural needs in her constituency while engaging in superficial fixes elsewhere across the island.

Speaking at a political meeting in Sion Hill, St James, on Sunday, Gilding-Bourne denounced what she described as the government’s failure to prioritise the needs of ordinary Barbadians, particularly in rural and agricultural communities. She took aim at the state of roads in Christ Church East, alleging selective upgrades based on visibility rather than necessity.

“You check the road from Pilgrim Road gas station down to Fairy Valley, Thyme Bottom—horrible. Breedy Land—horrible. Hopewell Road—horrible,” she said. “But yet we see the government digging up perfectly good roads only to repair them so that they could come and say that dem paved the road. Rubbish.”

Gilding-Bourne highlighted a dangerous situation in Parish Land, where she said part of a road had collapsed, posing serious risks to residents.

“Despite the concerns and the danger that that poses to residents in Parish Land, the government will hire CO Williams to go and concrete pave the road down in Gibbons . . . but the other roads in the area still want fixing.”

She also challenged the government’s much-publicised rollout of electric buses, arguing that rural residents continue to suffer from unreliable public transport. “Even though the Barbados Labour Party likes to say that Barbados has the biggest fleet of electric buses in the Western Hemisphere, the people at Fairy Valley still don’t have reliable transportation,” she said. “Numerous persons have complained about the condition of the roads and the lack of public transportation.”

Returning to St James North, where she has been canvassing alongside her colleague and candidate for the area Felicia Dujon, Gilding-Bourne painted a similarly bleak picture.

“Out Reservoir Road… man I tell you, out there horrible. The roads out there are deplorable,” she said.

She said residents across low-lying areas such as Hopewell in Christ Church and Trents and Weston in St James North continue to experience persistent flooding during the rainy season.

“Eight houses down there with families can’t get in or out when the rain falls,” she said of Hopewell, noting the absence of government assistance to resolve the issue.

The DLP hopeful also raised concern about the lack of recreational space for young people in her constituency, stating that the government removed the Parish Land playing field nearly two years ago and has yet to replace it.

“That is affecting the youth in the area. There is no more scrimmaging in the evenings,” she said. “St Bartholomew School students also use that playfield — well, not anymore . . .”

As a part-time farmer herself, Gilding-Bourne said that food security was under threat due to chronic neglect. She said that while the government has promised new loan-funded interventions, there remains no meaningful effort to support water access or harvesting solutions.

“Farmers can’t get water for their crops. Crops need water,” she said pointedly. “We don’t see them focusing on trying to pipeline the water to the farmers appropriately so that farmers have their own water and don’t have to share water with the residents in the area—because the residents get water first, let’s be real. Farmers get after, if at all.”

She recounted her own challenges farming in Spencer’s, noting that although she had received water tanks, they were frequently empty.

“Sometimes weeks go by, you get a trickle of water,” she said. “I farm at night…. We use the little drainage of water we have to wet the melons, the squash, the cucumbers, whatever we got in the ground—expecting that when we come back the following day, the tank will be full. The tank is empty.”

She added that complaints to the Barbados Agricultural Development and Marketing Corporation (BADMC) fall on deaf ears and said even participants in the government’s Farmers’ Empowerment and Enfranchisement Drive (FEED) programme are struggling.

“Being a farmer is not easy,” she said. “There is a certain type of character you have to have in order to persist. You have to be disciplined… you would think that this government would give some necessary intervention to alleviate the complaints of farmers across Barbados.” (SZB)