WITH PRIME MINISTER Freundel Stuart still mulling over changes to his Cabinet, St Lucy Member of Parliament (MP) Denis Kellman is suggesting he name not one, but two deputies.
Stuart has already promised to make room in the Cabinet for Kellman, who has been standing in over the past four months as Minister of Environment, Water Resources Management and Drainage while Dr Denis Lowe was ill.
However, with Lowe now officially back at work, Kellman, the longest serving MP on the Government side, is asserting his position in the Democratic Labour Party administration.
“As it stands right now, I am the Minister of the Environment,” he told the SUNDAY?SUN in an interview in New York.
“But I cannot tell you what I will be tomorrow, because I will not prejudge the Prime Minister . . . . All of us serve at the pleasure of the Prime Minister,” he said.
Kellman however warned that Stuart was “no new kid on the block”.
“He [Stuart] has been around since the 1970s, like me . . . . We have been around the party for a long time. We spent a lot of our politics in the Opposition; so we have a better appreciation of things than a lot of other people,” he argued.
“That was why when we became a part of the Government we also understood what life was like in the Opposition, and we knew what to expect in Government,” he said.
Asked specifically if Stuart should appoint a Deputy Prime Minister, Kellman said it was a call that only the Prime Minister could make, but he went on to state: “One of the things I would say though is that it would be wise for him to strengthen the management of his leadership.
“In other words, do not narrow it, just keep it wide. Personally, I don’t see anything wrong with him having two deputies. But that’s a decision he alone must make,” he said, noting it would not be the first time Barbados had two Deputy Prime Ministers.