Today October 1st, 2020 is the 20th anniversary of the death of Dominica’s fifth prime minister, and human rights activist, Roosevelt “Rosie” Douglas.
Douglas died just eight months after becoming prime minister.
In honor of the late prime minister, Dominica News Online (DNO) shares, with our readers, which both provide some public education about one of the foremost Dominican civic leaders of our time.
The first is by Dominica-born attorney based in Maryland, USA, Gabriel Christian and the other features Dominica- born academic, Dr. Wills-Green, who became the first African descended dean of a Canadian university – Vanier.
@ Francisco Etienne-Dods Telemaque if you are going to be so petty as to take digs at someone’s type O (I am sure he knew it was BoggLing but missed the L), then you have a duty to make sure your correction is error free. So to be of assistance to you I hereby inform you that the term is actually “MIND boggling”, not “mine boggling”. Oh this is in no way is a commentary, analysis, opinion, or related input, on the subject matter of either of your posts, it has strictly to do with the grammar correction.
BTW. I am sure yours also was a simple type-o also and you knew the word was “mind”, but had to show how petty what you did was.
“Dr. Wills-Green, who became the first African descended dean of a Canadian university – Vanier”. That is incorrect. While I will give the highest accolades to Dr. Wills for all she has accomplished, she is not and never has been the Dean of any Canadian university. So please do not provide ammo to those who would jump on this as an excuse to denigrate her (by perhaps saying she has embellished her credentials). Vanier is a college in the Canadian sense of the word so akin to a US Junior college (or maybe Dominica State College for example). Typically students at Vanier college go to a University AFTER they graduate with a from that institution. There are only 2 English Universities in Montreal Canada – McGill University and Concordia University – as well as 2 French Universities, and I assure you neither has ever been lead by a black Dean or Principal.
The moments spent with Rosie will forever stay with me and many like minded. He cracked and open the gate way of human consciousness, for a vast number of today’s so-called successful Dominicans. In 2000, we met with Rosie at Georgetown U in Wash,DC, on his way to Australia, later, I would always asked myself, why Georgetown U ? my Brother ended up in the JAWS of the BEAST, the College of the USA’ Presidents and CIA operatives, my prayer was answered a week later. Co-intelpro put in place by the US Gov’t to undermine and destroy all leadership during the civil rights movement of the 1960′-70′, was extended to all aspiring leaders of the post Colonial World, “KILL THEM BEFORE THEY GROW”. ROSIE paid the Ultimate price for being on the side of JUSTICE for the Dispossessed, from his Fathers Estate to the Halls of Dominica’ governmental chambers, the Pure International Consciousness he was Incarnated with, gave him the qualities of best among us all. Dis is what BLACK POWER really…
My thoughts exactly, Rosie, Pierro (Lybia) and Bob Marley among others: Policy of Kill Them Before They Grow!
@Bob D, did you say: He cracked and open the gate way of human consciousness?
I know that we all like to flourish the thoughts of our mind with fancy words, but that “human consciousness” idea of yours above, is a bit overstated.
Rosie Douglas was a human being just like you and me, he has no power to open “human consciousness” not even if he was the most famous psychiatrist or physiologist unless he was given that gift from God, but yet still God Himself, would be the One doing that work through him
“Consciousness” is ruled by “conscience”, as I said above, God is the “Controller”; He conducts our level of consciousness, which must enter our mind. Some people’s mind is carnal, making them an enemy of God–that is where the choice of consciousness begins
Consciousness relates to man’s way of Life–that is why that concept is by the awakening from conscience into the mind–it is all about the work of the divine.
The consciousness of man determines the path which he takes in Life, that is why it can only be fed from God, to be reproduced on the grounds of our mind
The fruit is either right or wrong, good or bad; the state of man’s mind will decide whether to receive or reject, the decision is by man’s ability of “free will” whatever the choice he puts on display. Some people’s mind is “carnal”, making them God’s enemy, they cannot receive His Ways in Love, while some of us have the mind which is well disciplined “spiritually. Faith in God is the channel by which we receive Him
The good and right display will glorify God’s Nature in Love, the wrong and bad will cause Him to turn away from the displayer
So then, to say that Rosie Douglas was an awakening of “human consciousness” is way too much of a claim on his behalf; Rosie Douglas was only known by a handful of people of the World–I don’t know him. So that exaltation is way too high for him
Admin; the man you are honoring is a very poor choice: I knew him personally he was a politician, and by no way a human rights activists!
Let’s write the truth about the man; and I reiterate Rosie Douglas was not a human rights activists.
I am however sure he was more a ………………..
Do not forget what he did at the Sir George Williams University in Canada, after failing to graduate; we remember the fire; we also remember ……….that the closest he came to holding a paying job was when he ran Gadafe’s terrorists camps in Libya.
That’s true!
Don’t make a hero out of Rosie: Note: I know him personally I was in the niche until I found out it was all about communism!
We remember this:
The Sir George Williams affair (also referred to as “The Sir George Williams Computer Incident”) was a 1969 event at Sir George Williams University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, now a part of Concordia.
ADMIN: More information on Rosie Douglas and the George Williams University incident can be viewed via this link: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2000/oct/05/guardianobituaries.pollypattullo
I think the late Pierre Charles and Skerrit and company became disenchanted with Rosie towards the end of his life because they thought that Rosie was always out of the country traveling and returning home with an empty pocket and nothing to show for all his travels. To put it simple, the country was not developing. So when Skerrit was given the job of steering the ship, he Skerrit then embarked on an important agreement with the Chinese to fund four important pillar projects, The Windsor Park Stadium, The Dominica Grammar School, The EO Leblanc highway from Roseau to Portsmouth and lastly but most importantly, The Princess Margaret Hospital. Then it was history after. Things started rolling and moving left and right.
You must have mixed this up somehow! It’s Skerrit that easy wasted 250 million on travel in the last 16 years. What has he got to show for it, I mean something the country benefited from. I know he personally benefited in abundance!
Rosie’s death deserved a thorough investigation at least. Why wasn’t it done? More and more questions for Skerrit and his henchmen to answer.
My dad and Roosie were students at Sir George William University (now Concordia University) in Montreal back in the sixties. He liked Roosie and spoke very fondly of him.
People like Gabriel christian are and will always be a curse to Dominica and it’s people, he and all those who instigated the diaspora , they have placed Dominican in hunger, poverty and a very sad state of economic slavery, a nation depending on handouts, while they enjoy life in the USA, and forgetting those they left half cripple. While we remember some who has strive for great achievement with success. Some of us will never forget (Gabriel and his group) for placing the poor in such a predicament
The people that are a real curse to the people of Dominica are the likes of you, Skerrit Savarin, Austrie, Blackmoore, Baron, Registe and other member of the cabal. No ethics, no love of their country. The love for money will finish them of soon. A bunch of common gangsters!
I did not know Gabriel was in government for the past 20 years????? He really messed Dominica up!
Why curse yourself by showing envy and deep-seated rancour for your brother. The video above shows a man of intelligence, respect and refined quality who comes from the Nature Aisle and desires to see higher standards of EDUCATION that drives an economy with core SKILLSETS which would curb the takeover of foreign entities on your soil. How hard could it be to pay an Island-wide tribute to a man who’ve passed away knowing he was a stepping stone with right intentions for others who followed after him. Why suppress highlighting great men of Dominican soil while tongues are quick to broadcast full support for foreign influences. If Mandarin music (no disrespect) can be played on Dominica’s airways, how is it difficult for a Negro to show integrity to his own that preceded him. The brain-drain and historically disconnected alternatives that are culturally instituted in Dominica, has been its demise. I’m proud to see men of purpose who live in right Dominion as their Creator. Do not envy.
The silence of the DLP about the 20th anniversary of the death of Rosie is quite telling. Knowing what Rosie Douglas did for the DLP and Dominica I would expect the DLP to put a memorial service together today carried live on all radio stations especially on DBS and Karie FM. But nothing? Not even an open line so people like Pastor BJ and Peter Augustine could lead the nation into a time of prayer and healing? Nothing so Tony Astaphan and Simeon could have us to remember the sad day of October 1, 2000, just a day after Rosie came from a long trip in search of help for Dominica?
PM Skerrit talks about everything on his Anou Palay show , but avoids talking about Rosie?
Boy could their silence be the reason why Dominica seems to be going nowhere and keeps getting worse every day? Could their silence be the reason DA under a curse? I know some of you hypocrites will try to tell me that we are not under a curse but when I read Deuteronomy 28, I know we not experiencing a blessing.
While I appreciate the article and the sentiments shared by Gabriel Christian, I must say that I have a few questions:
1. Why did it take Mr. Gabriel Christian, who resided in the US to remind us that it’s 20 yrs since Rosie died?
2. Prior to 2000, the DLP was a dead party had it not been for Rosie Douglas that brought us back in power in 2000 and the DLP has been in power ever since. So why is the DLP so silent about his anniversary?
3. Why did the DLP not organize a memorial service in memory of the late Roosevelt Douglas?
4. Why is the DLP behaving as if they do not want us to remember the late Rosie?
5. It was Rosie that brought the likes of Skerrit, Vince Henderson and Blackmore into politics, while Regional Austrie and Matthew Walters were his best friends. So why are all of them so quite to the point that it had to take Gabriel Christian to remind us of his death?
6. Is their something about his death that the DLP leadership knows about his death that we don’t know?
“I hear he have Cancer”
“I hear he have Yellow Fever”
“Something in he bladder”
“And a double dose of leukemia”
Two gossip mongers gossipin’
I stand up in a corner listenin’
Before I could ask who dey talking ’bout
A newspaper boy start to shout, hey!
Extra! Extra! Read all about it!
[Chorus]
Who kill de Sparrow? Nobody know
(Sparrow dead!)
If you see dis woman
(Sparrow dead!)
Wid a flag in she hand
(Sparrow dead!)
She bang on she belly
(Sparrow dead!)
Tellin’ everybody
(Sparrow dead!)
So as a Laborite I am asking his friends and colleagues in cabinet the same question Sparrow asked. So I ask Roosevelt Skerrit, Vince Henderson, Reginald Austrie, Ambassador Matthew Walter, Emmanuel Nathan and Raymond Blackmore since they were the ones that served with him. Hon men, what do you know aboutwho killed Rosie and how did he die?
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John served with Jesus until his death and they all gave an account of his death. Please guys give an…
The death of Rosie 20 yrs later is still very disturbing and as a Laborite myself, I cannot believe that the DLP never investigated his death and, his political son Roosevelt Skerrit, who has the same name as Rosie never investigated his death. The Mighty Sparrow wrote a song in the 70’s “Sparrow Dead” and everytime I think of Brother Rosie, the song comes to mind. Let me share some lines with you:
“I hear he have Cancer”
“I hear he have Yellow Fever”
“Something in he bladder”
“And a double dose of leukemia”
Two gossip mongers gossipin’
I stand up in a corner listenin’…
[Chorus]
Who kill de Sparrow? Nobody know
(Sparrow dead!)
If you see dis woman
(Sparrow dead!)
Wid a flag in she hand
(Sparrow dead!)
She bang on she belly
(Sparrow dead!)
Tellin’ everybody
(Sparrow dead!).
20 yrs after the burial of Rosie, the question that I and many people in Dominica, the region and international word is asking is, “Who killed Rosie”
If Rosie was alive today, i wonder if king greedy, who hides money all in his nostrils at the expense of needy Dominicans would not have been dismissed…!
What a shame nothing Rosie espoused has been taken on board by this DLP…Greediness has taken over to such an extent, that Aljazeera in a documentary exposing their avaristic leadership referred to them as hungry hyenas, who take 90% of the people’s wealth, and still ask for their share from the remaining 10%…
RIP Rosie
The big difference here is Rosie was born into wealth and prominence which he never cared for. Those in the governance of the country today crave wealth and prominence they never had before.
It is such a shame that this is what all Rosie’s hard work has come to. However, we should not lose hope as evil can live on for ever. There must be a day of reckoning.
Rosie Douglas, was not born into any wealth, that is a misconception that anybody who owned a bit of land and a Bedford or Asutin truck, in their day in the country pretend they were rich; in the case, Robert; his father owned a small Estate, he was a farmer growing Bananas, and grapefruits and a few coconut trees.
He also had a small motorized boat transporting people from Portsmouth to Roseau.
The first time they sail to to Barbados it broke down, and that was the end they did not have the money to repair; hence it became junk in Barbados.
Hahahahahahahahahahahahah!
He also operated a small clothing store, and a grocery/rum shop; in those days people like that Dominicans thought were, rather they were also poor, as I said could only eat better than the average Dominican.
……………………………………………………………….
Admin; I am shocked that you left out the submission where I spoke about Rosie’s tenure at the Sir George Williams University!
That is well documented!
As I always say the bitter and the sweet goes together. If there are people prepared to make Rosie a hero, which he was not; the truth must be known.
Look at it this way, most people who revolved around Rosie in his day as prime minister are practically all dead; if he lived he would be just past 78 – 80 years old.
A person forty years and younger in Dominica, reading about Rosie in 2020 most will ask Rosie Douglas who?
If the authors intend to write Roosevelt Rosie Douglas into the nations history; people need to know the facts and documented truth about him.
Therefore I responded according to the first comments; to be fair about it; I think people need to know all about it in an honest sense of truth, even if the truth some may not like!
ADMIN: Your comment was posted along with an external link to an article that describes the incident.
Okay, I just saw it: thanks!
Telemaque, I need to point out the way of negative mind for everything and everyone in Dominica.
You keep bringing up your existence of the stone ages to ridicule other people’s way of living, such as the way you speak about Rosie’s father; don’t you realize that you are speaking worse about your own lifestyle in those days? Well, that is what it means to me.
You were non-existent to me hadn’t I entered the comment board of DNO; but I have no idea how old I was in Dominica, when I used to hear about Rosie Douglas’ father, what I heard about him was that he was a rich man and he was a member of the Freedom Party.
But speaking about how people were not rich in their lifetime, you too; when I came to Canada in 1974, the banks used to handwrite our passbook–just like in Dominica. The TTC fare was 25¢, and the minimum wage was $2. 25¢. Are you also saying that those in control we also poor people in 1974?
“You keep bringing up your existence of the stone ages to ridicule other people’s way of living, such as the way you speak about Rosie’s father; don’t you realize that you are speaking worse about your own lifestyle in those days? Well, that is what it means to me. “(Elizabeth).
Elizabeth, I must suggest again that you simply shut up; it as you said you heard about Robert Douglas; however, I did not hear about him, as a kid I knew the man!
Every fortnight; that is every two week my grandmother would ride in a truck (bus) belonging to Maurice Telemaque, and travel to Portsmouth to shop in Robert Douglas grocery shop, because his goods were cheaper than what we bought in the village shops.
I am telling you again people like him and my cousin return from Curacao where they worked for Shell Oil refinery, some like Douglas, and Maurice went into the grocery business, Maurice was a auto mechanic, and owned bakery, and shop.
Owning things in that day the have not!
People with nothing consider them rich; but as you see in Dominica even in the twenty-first century you see people owing cars, trucks; however, when they get sick you read on DNO and hear on radio, they begging for handouts to go off the island for medical treatment.
But to many people in Dominica the transport owners are rich; I am not like you running off your mouth about what I don’t know.
In 1958 or there about my late mother husband Hilborne Robin co-signed for someone to buy a four-ton Bedford truck; everybody in Wesley claimed my step father was rich; nevertheless, he worked on Woodford Hill Estate; all he had was a bit of land he used as collateral, the cost of the truck was in 1958 three thousand pounds.
In case you do not know the equivalent equal fourteen ($14,400.00) thousand four hundred dollar. People saw that and thought both my step father and the other fellow was rich.
You know I do have to forgive because I know something is wrong with you; I am discovering more and more that you are not a normal person!
Let me remind you; that my first knowledge of you was on Fred White Website “Sakafete.”
I will not go into too much detail, nevertheless, some guy fell off a mountain in Dominica and died.
You wrote on Sakafet that someone of the people or person whom was with him murdered him.
I suspect what the problem was, I suggest Vertigo; which you know you suffer from, I wrote a brief about it on Sakafet.
Later I went into detail; you told me the way I wrote and explain about it you understand it better than when your doctor explained it to you.
Since then; there is a thug-of – war between us, even the day when I was in you house eating you food and drank you beer eh!
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahha.
If you wish I write about the diseases again let me know.
@Francisco, l am trying to understand please help me if you can what has Dominica done wrong to you guys always being negative and nasty to everything dominica regardless of what this is mind bogging to most outsiders seeing that Dominica is such a beautiful island to visitors?
Man Dog; you need to understand Dominica “the land of Dominica, we have nothing against; nevertheless we detest the people’s mentality.
It would appear that every one of us as long as we are in Dominica we live in some sort of illusion!
We detest the leaders who does not wish to develop the country; we detest Roosevelt Skerrit who deliberately do everything within his power to keep the people and country poor, while he and his passports agents are millionaires, and billionaires!
We detest the fact that someone graduating secondary school, and two year college cannot get employed on the island.
I detest the corruption; and let me be frank; Roosevelt corruption; it is about him!
Every other island even small Montserrat makes progress, proof of that is the many Dominicans who found employment in Montserrat, while there is nothing for them to do in Dominica.
Guy, if I hated the place of my birth, I would not have spent the amount of money
Indeed Man Dog, if I hated Dominica, I would not have spent the amount of money I spent in Wesley this year alone building a house from the ground up for my sister, creating employment for quite a few people.
Since Maria blew people’s houses away, and severely damage others; I know Emlord Timothy, my cousin repaired his house; my late father house was broken up, I understand a brother of mine might have repaired it; other than that, all the other damage houses are in the same shape as Maria left them!
Why are so many people suffering while Roosevelt total rent in 52 weeks (one year) is costing the taxpayers of Dominica eight hundred thousand plus, almost a million dollars?
Are the rest of Dominicans not human?
Man Dog, you should join with me in calling for an insurrection in the country to overthrow Roosevelt Skerrit who is a corrupted tyrant.
As long as Roosevelt is prime minister Dominica is doomed!
“Dominica done wrong to you guys always being negative and nasty to everything dominica regardless of what this is mind bogging”
So, Man Dog, I forgot to comment on that in the quote. I am like this.
If I am going to help someone, I am obligated to go all the way; here is a bit of knowledge!
” bogging ”
The term is actually “mine boggling ” which is defined as “overwhelming or startling.”
It is suppose to be an informal adjective!