Government Information Service

by Emmanuel H. Joseph
Government Information Service

On Sunday, 25th January, 2009 the Dominica Cadet Corps observed Cadet Day at Grand Bay under the distinguished patronage of the President of Dominica, His Excellency Sir Nicholas J. O. Liverpool and Mrs. Liverpool and the Prime Minister of Dominica, the Honourable Roosevelt Skerrit. This is the sixth (6th) time that the day has been observed in Dominica ever since the reorganisation of the Cadet Corps in 2001. The theme for the occasion was “Voluntarism” the same theme being used for the year by the Cadet Corps here in Dominica.

Addressing the ceremony was Mr. Francis Richards, Commandant of the Dominica Cadet Corps. In his address, Commandant Richards focused on the theme for the year singling out the many service voluntary groups on the island including the Red Cross, Boy Scouts, Girls Guides, Kiwanis and Lions Clubs. He took the time out to highlight how much the Cadets have achieved with little training and called on Dominicans from every sector to lend a helping hand to assist the cadets in their quest for professional training.

Commandant, Dominica Cadet Corps- Francis Richards

“Without much training, our cadets have already shown the courage and organisation when they assisted in recovery efforts during the Portsmouth earthquake in 2004 and Hurricane Dean in 2007. However, we now need all Dominicans to appreciate the need to come forward and join with the cadets and other voluntary service organisations…We need doctors to come forward, teachers, radio operators, computer experts and web designers, business owners, dentists, nurses, engineers, bus drivers, heavy duty operators, cooks and ordinary patriots who love Dominica to come forward and so equip the cadets with the ability to meet the challenges of development and those posed by natural and other disasters as they arise.”

Meantime, Chairman of the Dominica Social Investment Fund (DSIF), Marcus Francis, presented a cheque of six hundred and seventy thousand, eight hundred East Caribbean dollars (XCD$670 800.00) to the Dominica Cadet Corps for the implementation of a project geared at behavioural and skills development aimed at improved self esteem and national development. The project targets one hundred (100) members of the Dominica Cadet Corps in Marigot, Portsmouth, Roseau and Grandbay.

According to Mr. Francis, the project seeks to provide these persons with technical, vocational and life skills that will increase the chances of employment, hereby helping them to overcome dependency and to escape poverty. It will contribute to an enhanced self image and self esteem of participants. In general, the project will facilitate the Cadet Corps in fulfilling its mandate of providing consistent and quality training to its members, thereby, improving their socio-economic conditions and alleviating other social problems. The project includes components in music, culinary arts, sewing, health and family life, disaster management and building construction.

The construction phase will yield positive results for the Cadet Corps.

“We take special note, that at the end of the building construction module, a permanent facility will be available to the Cadets for the purpose of executing its daily functions and activities; in simple words, an establishment of its own headquarters.”

The Youth Division will work in close collaboration with DSIF for the implementation of some of these modules.

Also making donations to the Dominica Cadet Corps was UNESCO. Secretary General of the Dominica National Commission for UNESCO, Gloria Shillingford, presented a cheque of twenty-two thousand US dollars (USD$22 000.00) or fifty-nine thousand, one hundred and thirty East Caribbean dollars (XCD$59 130.00) to go towards the implementation of several training programmes focusing on topics such as HIV AIDS prevention and awareness, drug abuse prevention to ensure our youth live long productive and healthy lives. In addition, the project targets planned training in first aid, water and fire safety and relief management in the event of civic emergencies and disasters enabling the cadets to increase their human resources in these areas and to benefit the wider society

Mr. Luther Cozoan, a non national from Canada who in the past through the person of Mr. Atherton Martin, had made a donation of used musical instruments, also made a presentation of a plaque signifying the ongoing support from his organisation in Canada.

In the meanwhile, Prime Minister, Hon. Roosevelt Skerrit, in his address echoed earlier sentiments on the spirit of voluntarism using the revitalisation of the Cadet Corps as an example of how much someone can commit to nation building. He went to state that much more can be achieved if we focus more on the positive things of this country.

“In our country, we always find time to speak about the negative. We fail to see the good things that are happening in this beautiful country called Dominica and to pay attention to the several persons who continue to volunteer their time and energy to ensure that we can have a Dominica to boast and speak of. Today, the Cadet Corps is here and I want to recognise the contribution of Commandant Richards, a man who stood fast in ensuring that the Cadet Corps could be here. He did so through his voluntary spirit and interest in Dominica’s development; and of course, there are several other volunteers who played their part in ensuring that we could have a Cadet Corps today.”

The Prime Minister went on to express his concern as to the number of secondary schools that are fully committed to the Cadet Corps and issued a call to principals to get on board.

“I want to say that I am concerned over the fact that out of all the secondary schools in Dominica which are participating in this Cadet Corps programme, only the Portsmouth Secondary School has a school teacher attached to the Cadets Corps. This is a cause for concern and I hope that the principals of the various schools will put an end to this as early as next week because if we are to speak about developing our children, if we are to speak about moulding our children, if we are to speak about addressing incidence of violence at schools, we must support programmes such as the Cadet Corps which is helping us to do that very important work.”

The Prime Minister also thanked DSIF and UNESCO for their contributions towards the Cadet Corps.