Weekly Report - 30 March 2004

Long-ruling prime minister Lester Bird clearly sensed that his time had run out: the weekend before the 24 March general elections he had boxloads of documents carted away from his office. What he may not have anticipated was the scale of his defeat: the opposition United Progressive Party (UPP) led by Baldwin Spencer took 12 of the 17 seats in parliament. Even Bird lost his seat.