Political analyst says ABLP poised to retain government

The Antigua Barbuda Labour Party is predicted to hold onto the reins of government once the current state of affairs is preserved until March 21.
On Saturday, Gaston Browne, the prime minister, announced that voters will be heading to the polls in just 25 days.
Now, Arvel Grant, a political analyst, said the ABLP administration will likely get a second consecutive term in office.
“The status quo, as obtained in the first week of February preserved into the day of election, Prime Minister Browne will get a second term,” Grant said yesterday.
He noted, however, there are certain risks the ABLP will be taking with Asot Michael, Member of Parliament for the St. Peter constituency and other prospective candidates.
In October, Browne revoked the Cabinet appointment of Michael, the Tourism and Investment Minister, pending the outcome of his arrest by the Metropolitan Police in London.
The prime minister explained that he received news from Antigua and Barbuda’s High Commissioner in London, Karen-Mae Hill, that she had been informed that Michael was arrested upon his arrival in England.
Grant said should Michael find himself in any other scandal, his candidacy could be in trouble. He said Michael continues to be a risk to the Antigua Barbuda Labour Party going forward.
“I have never met Asot Michael. I don’t know him. I have no particular feeling about him one way or the other, but, for his public performance and utterances given the two [scandals]… and the response of the prime minister, one gets the impression that the prime minister may have found himself moving faster than his party in some matters of transparency. But, you get the impression that the prime minister doesn’t want Michael as part of his team,” Grant said.
(More in today’s Daily Observer)