Mia Mottley seeking fresh mandate as polling stations open in Barbados for snap election

Barbados, the world's newest republic, goes into snap elections today (19 January 2022). The ruling party seeking a new mandate to lead the island out of a deep economic depression.Prime Minister Mia Mottley of the Barbados Labour Party (BLP) is widely anticipated to win re-election, while people are blaming the economic downturn on the pandemic and a lack of tourist activity.Currently, the Mia Mottley led BLP holds 29 of the 30 legislative seats on the island. The polls are open from 6am to 6pm, and the results will come due later that evening.According to the International Monetary Fund, the GDP rose 3.3 percent last year after plunging 18 percent in 2020. Even after restructuring its bonds and entering an IMF programme, the country's debt burden of 138 percent of GDP is still the largest in the Americas, second only to Venezuela."It will take three to four years for Barbados to recover to pre-pandemic levels, but keep in mind that we were already in a recession before the pandemic," said Marla Dukharan, a Bridgetown based economist.Mottley, 56, is one of the most well-known politicians in the Caribbean, and she stunned many when she called elections less than four years into her five-year term."I'm worried that if we go into 2022 as a divided country, we'll stifle and hinder our own progress," she remarked.Deal with the IMFMottley restructured the debt, which was running at 160 percent of GDP at the time, and negotiated a $465 million loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund after the BLP gained all 30 seats in parliament in 2018.