Hector John

Hector “Spags” John worked as a statistics officer for the banana industry for 16 years before venturing into politics where he became the Opposition Leader in the House of Assembly under the United Workers Party (UWP).

Born in October 1970 in the village of Salisbury, John attended the Dominica Grammar School and then proceeded to New York in the USA where he obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Information Technology from Monroe College. He represented Monroe College at ATHGO Conference in Washington DC in 2008 and was the first student to address a graduation ceremony of the institution in 2009. He was president of the Multicultural Students Association (MSA) and first President of NSBE, Monroe College Chapter.

After working for nearly two decades as a statistics officer and information technology assistant in Dominica, John joined politics. He led the Salisbury Improvement Committee and was a leader of the Salisbury Catholic Youth Movement among other organizations.

Hector John contested the 2009 general election for the Salisbury constituency on the UWP platform. He defeated Bentley Royer of the Dominical Labour Party (DLP) to emerge the parliamentary winner. But given that the UWP had a total of only three seats to the DLP’s 18 seats, the party’s parliamentary winners boycotted the House of Assembly.

After John failed to resume plenary sessions for three consecutive times, Speaker of the House Alix Boyd-Knights declared his seat and that of other party members vacant. A by-election was called in 2010 and John defeated DLP’s Royers again the second time, and he was sworn in as UWP’s Opposition Leader in the House of Assembly in July 2010.

In 2019, John was arrested for making incitement statements but was released on bail and without any charges filed against him.