St Vincent and the Grenadines
Country in the West Indies, in the E Caribbean Sea, part of the Windward
Islands.
Government
The constitution dates from independence 1979. The head of state is
a resident governor general representing the British monarch. The governor
general appoints a prime minister and cabinet, drawn from and responsible
to the assembly. There is a single-chamber 21- member legislature, the
House of Assembly, comprising 15 representatives elected by universal
suffrage, and six senators, 4 appointed by the governor general on the
advice of the prime minister, and 2 on the advice of the leader of the
opposition. The assembly has a life of up to five years.
History
The original inhabitants were Carib Indians. Columbus landed on St
Vincent 1498. Claimed and settled by Britain and France, with African
labour (see slavery), the islands were ceded to Britain 1783. Independence
Collectively known as St Vincent, the islands of St Vincent and the
islets of the northern Grenadines were part of the West Indies Federation
until 1962 and acquired internal self- government 1969 as an associated
state. They achieved full independence, within the Commonwealth, as
St Vincent and the Grenadines, Oct 1979.
Until the 1980s two parties dominated politics in the islands, the
St Vincent Labour Party (SVLP) and the People's Political Party. Milton
Cato, SVLP leader, was prime minister at independence but was challenged
1981 when a decline in the economy and opposition to new industrial-relations
legislation resulted in a general strike. Cato survived mainly because
of divisions in the opposition parties, and in 1984 the centrist New
Democratic Party (NDP), led by an SVLP defector and former prime minister,
James Mitchell, won a surprising victory. He was re-elected 1989, his
party winning all the assembly seats. The NDP was again successful,
but with a reduced majority, in the Feb 1994 general election. In 1994
a new opposition, left-of-centre party, the United Labour Party (ULP),
was formed by a merger of the SVLP and a smaller party. In 1991 representatives
of Dominica, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Grenada proposed
federal integration of the Windward Islands.
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