Every year we are told the same thing: the economy is “recovering,” investment is “up,” projects are “coming,” and tourism numbers are “strong.” But if you walk through any community in Saint Lucia and ask ordinary people what they feel, you will hear a very different report.
Groceries are higher.
Rent is higher.
Light bills are higher.
But somehow, the praise songs are still loud.
Something is not adding up.
We have built a culture where leaders congratulate themselves while citizens tighten their belts. Where success is declared from podiums, but stress is measured in supermarkets. Where the national conversation sounds prosperous, but the national mood sounds tired.
And the question that keeps slipping conveniently out of the headlines is the simplest one:
If the country is working… who is it working for?
Because it is clearly not working for the young worker juggling two jobs and still coming up short.
Not for the small business owner swallowing losses to keep staff paid.
Not for the families living month to month while being told to “be patient.”
And not for the pensioner who has to choose between medication and groceries.
When the official story is bright but the lived reality is dim, that gap is not an economic issue — it is a leadership issue.
We are becoming too comfortable with a politics that measures success from the top looking down, instead of from the ground looking up. A politics where numbers matter more than people. A politics where “growth” can happen without fairness, and where “stability” becomes a polite word for inequality.
And let us be honest: too many leaders have learned how to speak for the poor without ever standing where the poor stand.
It is easy to talk about resilience when you don’t feel the strain.
Easy to talk about sacrifice when you aren’t the one sacrificing.
Easy to preach patience when your own plate is full.
The national conversation feels unbalanced because the voices questioning power are too few… and too quiet. When pressure disappears, injustice grows roots. When discomfort is silenced, complacency becomes policy. When only polite voices are welcomed, real voices disappear.
But a country cannot rise on politeness.
A nation cannot improve on silence.
And people cannot progress if they are always told to wait their turn.
There comes a point when someone must ask — loudly, clearly, and without fear:
Why is the weight always on the same shoulders?
Why do the benefits always drift to the same corners?
And why is fairness always postponed but never delivered?
These are not divisive questions.
They are necessary questions — nation-saving questions.
If a society punishes those who speak plainly, it will end up rewarding those who do nothing at all.
And Saint Lucia deserves better than that.
The pot needs stirring not for drama, but for awakening.
Because still waters do not always mean peace — sometimes they mean silence.
And silence, in times of inequality, is the most dangerous comfort of all.