After 32 years as a legislator, Natural Resources and Labour Minister Omar Hodge remains “fully charged,” he and other Virgin Islands Party candidates said Saturday, as he launched his campaign for another term as Sixth District representative.

“I am here in support of your man, the ‘People’s Man,’ the Honourable Omar Wallace Hodge,” said Zoe Walcott-McMillan, who is running for an at-large seat on the VIP ticket. “Team VIP recognises the rich diversity and the metropolis that is District Six.”

Ms. Walcott-McMillan was one of several speakers who addressed the crowd in a mixture of Spanish and English, saying Mr. Hodge “bridged the great divide between Spanish and English [speaking] nationals.”

When Mr. Hodge addressed the crowd gathered outside La Mall Disco & Hot Spot in Baughers Bay, he alluded to his record of helping the Dominican Republic community through his ministry, including by helping them obtain work permit exemptions, which he said give them more negotiating power with employers.

“You can’t shut out these people,” he said, explaining that many DR nationals on Tortola are descendants of Virgin Islanders who went overseas to work, many of them in the sugar cane industry.

“Most of them are our family,” he said.

Premier praised

Mr. Hodge also praised Premier Ralph O’Neal for his work to assist VI residents.

“It seems to me, the older the premier gets, the more compassionate he gets,” Mr. Hodge said. Mr. O’Neal is happy to assist “the Spanish people who are so emotional when they’re seeking help,” or anyone else who asks for his assistance, Mr. Hodge said.

“He will listen to the little raggedy man,” Mr. Hodge said of the premier.

Mr. Hodge also assisted workers throughout the territory with his efforts to develop what became the 2010 Labour Code, said Vernon Malone, a VIP at-large representative seeking re-election.

“I watched him as he laboured for the Labour Code,” Mr. Malone said. “He worked as hard as he could to make sure that you, the people, will be represented properly in the workplace.”

The VIP will work to create jobs and boost salaries by developing additional tourist attractions throughout the territory, like caves at Brewers Bay, underwater caves at Norman Island and historic sites connected to William Thornton, the Jost Van Dyke-born architect of the United States Capitol, he added.

Mr. Malone, a former police commissioner, also called for improvements in police training and the establishment of a “proper police training school” in the territory, so officers can learn the techniques of “modern crime-fighting” here.

“A training school in the BVI can teach the police more about nuts-and-bolts policing,” he said.

‘The Facts Man’

Keith Flax, another VIP at-large representative appealing to voters for another term, praised his party for finding “painless ways of raising revenue in these troubled times,” listing increased fees at the Commercial Court and in the financial services sector as measures he said don’t affect typical working Virgin Islanders.

Increased registration of oceangoing vessels through the VI Shipping Registry and registering aircraft and their engines in the territory will also boost revenue from overseas, he said.

“Don’t forget The Facts Man,” he told voters, referring to his campaign nickname.

Ms. Walcott-McMillan also called for voters’ support, reciting the lyrics to her campaign song.

“Have you heard about this woman, with her banner standing tall, securing justice, freedom and peace for one and all?” she asked the audience, before explaining, “Zoe Walcott-McMillan is her name.”

She called for a “National Business Bureau” to assist entrepreneurs in the territory, and for teaching English as a second language in VI schools.

“I am here to promise you that it will not be business as usual,” she said, asking voters to keep the VIP in power and elect her to office.

Projects

Other speakers mentioned projects Mr. Hodge had undertaken in his district and around the territory. Mr. Hodge was instrumental in acquiring The Baths on Virgin Gorda, Education and Culture Minister Andrew Fahie said.

He also worked on legislation closing a loophole that let non-belongers buy land at foreclosure auctions without a non-belonger’s landholding licence, and worked for the expansion of the Alexandrina Maduro Primary School in Baughers Bay, Mr. Fahie said.

Deputy Premier Dancia Penn, the minister of health and social development, spoke of the recently completed Purcell Community Centre, which is to bear Mr. Hodge’s name.

Mr. Hodge said that work at his ministry sometimes keeps him from meeting with constituents.

“You know that people love me and like to see me every day, really, but that is impossible,” he said. The audience blew airhorns, waving green-and-white VIP flags and buzzing vuvuzelas.

“I love you,” one woman shouted to Mr. Hodge.

Supporters distributed shirts with Mr. Hodge’s photo and the slogan “fully charged.”

Mr. Hodge’s wife “is there saying he’s fully recharged,” Mr. Fahie told the crowd, arguing no one is better equipped to say if “a man [is] charged up than his wife.”