Stephenson King

Stephenson King (born 13 November 1958 ) is the former Prime Minister of Saint Lucia.

He is the Senior Minister and Minister for Infrastructure, Ports, Transport, Physical Development, and Urban Renewal.

King was the former candidate for the United Workers Party (UWP).

He now represents the constituency of Castries North as an Independent candidate as of July 2021, after resigning from the UWP.

He is the son of Grafton King; a renowned seaman, from Canouan, St.Vincent, and Marie Bernadette Satney, a seamstress from the village of Choiseul.

He attended the Methodist Infant and Primary Schools for his early infant and primary schooling.

Later, he was admitted to the Seventh Day Adventist Academy, where he continued his secondary education.

Following the completion of his secondary education, King gained employment at the former St. Lucia Co-operative Bank Ltd (now 1st National Bank of St Lucia), where he served for two and a half years.

He resigned in 1981 to accept an offer from the law firm of Floissac and Giraudy, where he served for seven years as Accountant, Trade Marks Clerk/Paralegal.

In 1981 following the inaugural youth conference of the United Workers Party, King was elected the President of the party's youth arm.

In 1982 after having actively participated in the election campaign of that year he was appointed a City Councilor of the Castries City Council and a board member of the St. Lucia Housing Authority, serving in both capacities for 5 years.

During that period he also formed and became the founding President of the Rotaract Club of Saint Lucia, resigning in 1987 when he entered elective politics.

Stephenson entered the political fray on the island when he was nominated as the candidate for the Castries North-East Constituency.

In the first election on 6 April 1987 he got 2,411 votes against former Prime Minister Michael Pilgrim of the St Lucia Labour Party (1772 votes) and Oswald Augustin of the Progressive Labour Party (846 votes).

In the second (snap) election on 30 April 1987 he polled 2,731 votes to Pilgrim's 2,549 votes and Augustin's 375 votes.

He was then appointed as a Cabinet Minister, serving as the Minister for Community Development, Social Affairs, Youth, Sports, and local Government.

He faced the electorate again in 1992 against lawyer Wilkie Larcher of the St Lucia Labour Party.

He was able to register a bigger victory this time polling 3,511 to Larcher's 2,009.

Following the election he was appointed to the Cabinet as the Minister for Health, Local Government, Information and Broadcasting.

He would succumb in the tumultuous defeat of the United Worker's Party in the 1997 election where he was defeated by George Odlum on a St Lucia Labour Party ticket.

The results of the election show Odlum overcoming the incumbent 3960 to 2604, the lowest number of votes King would ever gain in an election.

He took a nine-year sabbatical from elective politics although remaining chairman of the party for most of this period.

Following a short-lived struggle between himself and Cybelle Cenac for that right King received the endorsement of the United Workers Party in 2006 to contest the general elections as the candidate for Castries North.

He would defeat the sitting Minister of Agriculture at the polls, which also saw his United Worker's Party return to office.

The UWP won a majority of seats in the 2006 election, and a new government under Compton was sworn in on 19 December 2006.

King was named Minister for Health and Labour Relations.

Compton's illness in May 2007 prompted King to be named Acting Prime Minister.

In a cabinet reshuffle in early June 2007, he became Minister of Finance (inclusive of International Financial Services), External Affairs, Home Affairs, National Security, Labor, Information and Broadcasting.

In an ironic twist, King assumed the mantle while a few months earlier he had been seen as a Lewis loyalist in the party's leadership race.

Compton died on 7 September 2007, and King announced his death on 8 September.

King was subsequently sworn in as Prime Minister by Governor-General Pearlette Louisy on 9 September.

The ten UWP members of the House of Assembly agreed on King's designation as Prime Minister.

King reshuffled the cabinet on 12 September.

In addition to Prime Ministership, he assumed the roles of External Affairs, Home Affairs and National Security.

King also held the modified portfolio of Minister of Finance (including International Financial Services), Economic Affairs, Economic Planning and National Development.

Earlier in 2008 Prime Minister King came under pressure, first from leader of the opposition Dr. Kenny Anthony and then from his own parliamentary wing, to dismiss Economic Planning Minister Ausbert D'Auvergne.

He eventually acquiesced and returned Choiseul representative Rufus Bousquet to his cabinet, defusing the impasse.

King also dismissed the representative of Central Castries and Minister of Housing Richard Frederick from cabinet in 2011, following a scandal created by the revocation of his visitors and diplomatic visas by the United States Government.

The King administration suffered defeat in the 2011 general elections on 28 November 2011, obtaining only 6 out of 17 seats in Parliament.

He was subsequently Leader of the Parliamentary Opposition from November 2011 to January 2014.