Article content continued

According to Trinidad newspaper Daily Express, Legault, a career diplomat, outlined percentages of women in the legislatures of other Caribbean countries during her address at an event last week and said, “I think every country is ready for a male or female prime minister. Gender does not have an impact.”

Legault was responding to comments earlier this year from a political scientist, Maureen Holder, who questioned whether Barbados was ready for a female prime minister or not. According to reports, Holder raised this question while speaking at the headquarters of the DLP, the party in power.

“Has this nation given (a female prime minister) any serious thought, or is it a case that people are so fed up with the DLP that they feel they have no other choice but to accept the next best alternative?” Holder said in January, according to Nation News.

In response, Jones reportedly told a room of DLP supporters in the capital, Bridgetown that while he likes Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, “I ain’t going up there and tell anybody to vote for he.”

Legault was not the only Barbados resident to weigh in on those comments. A female senator who attended the meeting was quoted saying she firmly believes Barbados is ready for a female prime minister, but maybe Holder meant “not this particular female.” An editorial in The Barbados Advocate concluded that a public debate on the issue “would not only be embarrassing to us as a developing nation that is wedded in constitutionality to the equality of the sexes but also wasteful, given the imminence of a general election where one of the main parties in the contest is led by a woman.”