by Kevon Browne
St. Kitts and Nevis (WINN)—The Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis is approaching another year-end, and people have questioned whether a double salary would be on the horizon.
The Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, Hon. Dr Terrance Drew, did not disclose whether public-sector employees will receive a bonus, instead focusing on other investments made for the betterment of the Federation.
“I cannot say. I don’t think it’s ever tradition to sit at a press conference and declare it like that, but I would say we, this year, we have invested significantly into the sustainable island state because if that category five hurricane had hit us bad, we would have been in serious trouble. I want to invest what we have in water. Where do you live, Bart? You have water 24-7? So you’re somebody who is very fortunate. But there are people in St. Kitts and Nevis, for example, I mean St. Kitts, who live, for example, in Shadwell. Serious water problem. In St. Peter’s, there is a serious water problem. So we had to take over $50 million in cash and just invest right away in drilling and desalination plants. That’s the priority. When you look at the state of our hospital, a leaking roof, we fix it, it leaks, we fix, but we are keeping up to making sure it doesn’t continue to leak because integrity is affected. We are being told that the roof has served its purpose. And so that is why we have to invest millions of dollars into a healthcare facility. When you look at the Basseterre High School that was neglected for seven years under the previous administration, we are pumping money into that to get it going.”
Dr Drew emphasised that the focus should be on investing in water, energy, health services and infrastructure.
“We have invested, are moving to invest 40 to 50 million U.S. dollars in new generators. So our focus has been energy, which is very basic. I mean, we don’t have all the money in the world, but where would we invest? In energy. In water. In hospital. In housing. In infrastructure. And the next thing, and we have invested significantly, for example, the ambulances. Five brand-new ambulances because we had an ambulance issue. Imagine ambulance would show up at people’s homes without oxygen because of the state of our ambulances. We have to invest millions into that as well. These are very basic, basic things we have to invest in. Millions upon millions of dollars to get us to the sustainable island state so that we can survive. So that is where our focus has been.”
The Prime Minister and Minister of Health restated the importance of implementing a national health insurance program and highlighted the gap in proper access to healthcare due to a lack of financing and private insurance to cover medical costs.
“This is a different reality. It is a different world. And the other thing that we’re looking at is national health insurance. We have the study. The study’s completed. I’ve met with the actuary, Mr Derek Osborne. He’s from the Bahamas. And it’s done. That is our big thrust in 2026 to get our people fully insured. You hear people sick and they’re walking around with sponsor sheets. We have to prioritise it. Asking our people to prioritise the country. The realities are different. I know I took the children off the street with sponsor sheets. And we have spent significantly to take care of our children so that no mother with a child in St. Kitts and Nevis has to go around with a sponsor sheet anymore or put up a GoFundMe because unless they choose to, but we are funding our children who necessarily need medical treatment, advanced medical treatment. And we have saved a lot of children. That is where we have pumped our money. And now we want to get to the stage where we have national health insurance, a national plan that can cover almost all of our people, if not all of our people. That is going to require us to contribute to some extent to it. You can’t have it any other way. And anybody who says you can have it any other way, they are fooling you.”
The Prime Minister continually emphasised a different reality: one where the focus is not on luxury but on investing in the basics necessary for the Federation’s long-term survival.
