Gonsalves announces plans to bring home stranded Vincentian sailors

KINGSTOWN (CMC):

Prime Minister Dr Ralph Gonsalves says his administration plans to bring home Vincentian sailors who have been stranded on cruise and other ships due to the coronavirus pandemic.

“There are Vincentians who are still out there who want to come home, just as Vincentians, overwhelmingly, took the opportunity to come home between the 18th and the 28 [of March] when we had the last flight,” said Gonsalves on the weekend.

He said some employers want charter flights to bring these Vincentians home.

“But, clearly, from where they are coming, it is going to be important that they be tested and that their employers, for instances, in the case of a cruise ship who may like them to come, they’ll have to organise here, under our own supervision in quarantine facilities after they had been tested properly overseas,” Gonsalves said.

“We can’t deny our citizens the right to come home, but we have to put the parameters and the protocols in place under which they can come.”

The prime minister said he knows some people will say that he should let Vincentians who are overseas stay where they are.

“And there is merit in that, but there is the consideration on the other hand.”

He said these are “good people, who have made important contributions to their families and to this country … . We can’t just turn out back on them; they are citizens of our country, but they have to understand they cannot – you are on quarantine, you have to stay on quarantine,” he said.