After snubbing him, NDP to honour political giant Ralph T. O’Neal OBE!
Many residents, civil society, the media and talk show hosts saw the abrupt dissolution of the House of Assembly (HoA) without allowing the then retiring Leader of the Opposition to give an address after forty years of service was yet another insult to Mr O’Neal’s legacy.
Insults & disrespect to Mr O’Neal by NDP
During the campaign of 2011, controversial Minister for Education and Culture Hon Myron V. Walwyn insulted Mr O’Neal by calling him an “emperor without clothes”.
In May this year, during the just concluded general election campaign, the same Hon Walwyn told the VIP and the people that they should keep Mr O’Neal at home and “stop dragging him out in the middle of the fore-day morning to come campaign for you all”.
Many residents and the VIP took this as an insult and disrespect to the political stalwart for Mr Walwyn to suggest that the former veteran legislator was a child not capable of making his own decisions in campaigning for the party he led for 20 of his 40 years in office.
To top it all off, the NDP spent its three and half years, from 2011 to 2015, telling the people that Hon Ralph T. O’Neal while Minister of Finance from 2007-2011 left the country broke. Late in the 2015 campaign Mr O’Neal took to the airwaves in a national broadcast to debunk the claim. His message was confirmed by Premier Smith after his administration’s answers to questions in the House of Assembly contradicted the allegations of VIP leaving the country broke. Figures presented by Dr Smith to the HoA demonstrated that the NDP was lying to the people.
The new title
At the Second Sitting of the First Session of the Third House of Assembly to be held on Monday, July 6, 2015 Premier and Minister of Finance Dr The Honourable D. Orlando Smith and Leader of Government Business will bring a motion to bestow upon Hon Ralph T. O’Neal OBE the title of Member Emeritus for his most distinguished, devoted, dedicated and selfless service to the territory of the Virgin Islands and its people, and for his role in the development of the territory.
The motion will include the HoA placing on record its sincere gratitude and appreciation to Hon O’Neal as it wishes him a happy and peaceful retirement.
The benefits of the new title are not immediately known. Way back in April 2009, it was former Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Communications and Works, the esteemed Julian Willock, who called on the Government to name something in honour of the political giant Hon O’Neal. Mr Willock was at the time chairing a ceremony to name the racetrack at Sea Cows Bay in honour of Ellis Thomas.
Mr O’Neal made history by becoming the longest serving legislator in the VI and the English speaking Caribbean. He served as an elected Member of Parliament for 40 consecutive years (1975-2015).
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Re Alan Frumin (United States): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Frumin
Re Mr Goh Chok Tong (Singapore): http://www.parliament.gov.sg/mp/goh-chok-tong?viewcv=Goh%20Chok%20Tong