ROSEAU, Dominica, CMC – Attorney General Levi Peter has apologized to the unsuccessful opposition nominee for the post of President of Dominica, saying that his reference to her as a “drumstick: had been taken out of context.
During last week’s parliamentary vote for the new president to replace Charles Savarin, whose two five-year terms ended on Sunday, Peter told legislators that the opposition should have supported the government’s nominee, Sylvanie Burton.
Peter told legislators that he had hoped the opposition “would have at least said, we have concerns, but we will support.
“But no, they chose to put up a drumstick. Mr. Speaker, that’s the height of idiocy. As the English would say, this is a situation where there is no possibility here is not a snowball chance in hell that that candidate could be elected in this House,” he added.
But there had been calls for Peter to resign, with the opposition nominee, Mrs. Anette Sanford, describing his remarks as “racist, abusive, and discriminatory on both moral and legal grounds.”
In his apology read out on the state-owned DBS radio on Monday, Peter said that he had never meant to insult or degrade the opposition nominee but had used a “light-hearted recounting of an event in which children on an outing to a fast food outlet expressed preference essentially for the same meal by a different name.
“The difference in the meals is that one included a drumstick. With the benefit of hindsight in making my statement, I may have ill-advisedly adopted the earlier light-hearted use of the word drumstick in referring to the nomination of Mrs. Anette Sanford.
“I meant Mrs. Sanford was not ill in my use of that word and certainly was not in any way seeking to ruin her character. As is clear to anyone who has listened or listened with an open mind to the statement, the statement was not about nor directed against Mrs. Sanford,” Peter said.
He told radio listeners that the statement was “rather about the process and motivation of others involved in bringing about her candidacy.
“…as the saying goes, context is everything,” he said, noting that a review of the Oxford English dictionary and even a Google search shows the universally known definitions of the word drumstick “are neither profane, derogatory, or otherwise offensive.
“However, it has been brought to my attention that some have ascribed unofficial street meanings which carry unsavory connotations to the word. This and replaying and recounting the statement without context would have led some to the erroneous conclusion that I had been intentionally derogatory in my statement”.
He said this is “furthest from the truth, and it was not my intention to impugn or otherwise offend Mrs Sanford or anyone else. I recognize that Mrs. Sanford and others have taken offense and accordingly take this opportunity to express my apologies for any feelings of hurt injury my statement may have inadvertently caused them,” the Attorney General said.
Dominica’s first-ever female head of state was elected by a margin of 205, with six government legislators and one opposition member absent.
Both Mrs. Burton and Mrs. Sanford is from the Kaliangoo Territory, where the descendants of the country’s indigenous people, the Caribs, still reside.
Mrs. Burton, 58, will be sworn into office later on Monday.
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