AN emotional Allen Chastanet has expressed deep sadness following a death over the weekend and has vowed to not let that death be in vain.
The island’s Prime Minister met with members of the local press yesterday morning at the Office of the Prime Minister to address recent topics of interest.
Among those topics was the matter of the untimely death of 50-year-old horse riding pioneer in St. Lucia, Winston Trim.
Trim passed away on Sunday after the motorcycle he was riding collided with a minibus in Micoud.
The horse enthusiast was one of the key liaisons and supporters of the Desert Star Holding project and worked closely with the government to see plans for the upcoming race track in the south of the island materialize.
Towards the end of the press briefing, the Prime Minister was asked to describe his thoughts on the death, to which he responded by saying the incident was an addition to a difficult week for him.
Chastanet stated that the death was a great loss to young people and for St. Lucia in general; however, he said he has no intentions of allowing the work of Trim to go unfinished.
He said: “I’m not going to let that spirit die. A lot of people are going to put all kinds of different spins on it, but the one truth that I know is that Winston believed in this project. It changed him and he changed to become a very responsible young person, a young man that all young people of St. Lucia should see as a beacon. And even if your lives seem hopeless at this point, it is within your power to control and change and he did that. He had a dream and held on to it and I for one promise to be able to embrace that dream and to know that what he started, we will finish.”
Chastanet revealed that the project was moving on to a new phase at the time of Trim’s death and that his demise will definitely be felt by all those involved.
He said: “The difference with Mr. Trim is not only did I know him, but I’ve been working very closely with him for the last couple of months since I came into government and it was his passion for this project, his passion for horse racing and what he felt it could do for the young people of the country. I was just with him on Friday when we had a meeting with the Minister of Agriculture, the Chief Veterinarian and the people from the DSH because they were just now about to implement the phase of training of young people and to start training all the different young horsemen. And to see the excitement that this thing was really happening, that they identified the voices in the region, they identified world-class trainers to come down here.”
Investigations into the incident are ongoing.
