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.... Letters & Opinion

02nd June 2012
Cannabis Movement celebrates first Anniversary

The Cannabis movement of Saint Lucia will be celebrating their one year anniversary this month and intends to celebrate the date with a series of activities including a fun raising beach bash and membership drive. Over the past year, the Movement has made a series of achievements and has realized several goals set for the twelve month period.

Some of the short term goals that were realized by the Movement were, the formation of a national Cannabis Movement, formulating a strategy on the way forward for the movement, the registering of the name of the Movement, designing a logo and the electing of officers to the interim committee. The members are: Chairman; Andre de Caires, Vice Chair; Dr Gilbertha St Rose, Treasurer; Mr. Randall Bain, Assistant Treasurer; Mr. Quint Odlum, Secretary; Mr. Paul Francis, Website management and information acquisition; Melanie Fraites, PRO; Mr. Gordon Rae

Some of the long term goals that were realized included the setting up of internet sites such as “No jail for ganja. Herb is not a crime” and “Cannabis Movement of Saint Lucia” on Facebook as well as contacting major stake holders to outline the intentions of the Movement, such as the Prime Minister at the time, the Honorable Stephenson King, the Director of the Drug Advisory Secretariat at the time, Mr. Clement Edward, the Police Commissioner, Mr. Vernon Francois, the Governor General, H.E. Dame Pearlette Louisy, Dr. Stephen King, and the President of the Bar Association, Mr. Andie George. We also met with the new director of the Drug Advisory Secretariat, Mr Cyprian Yarde. In all cases, the Talks were held in a cordial atmosphere where many issues and concerns were discussed openly. All agree that a paradigm shift in the attitudes of the general public towards cannabis related issues needs to take place before the relevant laws can be changed. All parties concede that only through education will the public be able to make a rational decision when considering future drug law policy. Other goals achieved by The Cannabis Movement were the staging of a Town Hall event in Castries where we commenced our educational drive. We had displays and showed a series of educational videos as well as answered questions from the general public. The Cannabis Movement also had a display booth at the “Wellness Fair” on the William Peter Boulevard last year and staged a presentation at the Sir Arthur Lewis Community College for one of the senior agricultural classes.
 
 
The Movement is presently involved in developing an education programme that we intend to present to the general public consisting of facts relating to the cannabis plant. On the advice of the Royal Saint Lucia Police Force, we have also added a prevention component as part of the educational campaign so that the public is made aware that our intention is not the promotion of the use of marijuana, but the decriminalization of the plant in all its beneficial forms.

Over the next twelve months The Movement’s goals include continuing to use Town Hall meetings and other appropriate venues to stage educational presentations, to broadcast messages in the electronic and print media, and to assess the attitude of the general public in relation to the proposal to decriminalize cannabis in all its forms by starting a petition signing campaign. Another important goal is the formation of a national committee that will include stakeholders such as the Police, the medical community, the religious community, the legal community, and all other interested stakeholders that together will influence the way forward in formulating a new, more relative and sensible drug law policy as it relates to cannabis. We intend to use the findings of this committee to persuade the Government to form a commission that will then take the issue to the next level.

Finally, the Cannabis Movement has taken extreme care and gone to great lengths to make a clear distinction between the industrial hemp plant whose raw materials are used in the making of thousands of industrial products and its infamous cousin that is primarily used for spiritual, medical and recreational uses. The Cannabis Movement will be lobbying strongly with and on behalf of the Industrial Hemp Initiative (IHI) for the Government to grant the necessary permissions to allow IHI to conduct research trials under the watchful eye of the Royal Saint Lucia Police Force and in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture to develop a stable cultivar that can be introduced to farmers as part of the country’s agricultural diversification drive.

Gordon Rae
PRO

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