Prime Minister Philip J. Pierre on Sunday announced that his administration plans to make Emancipation Day, observed annually on August 1, a major event on Saint Lucia's national calendar. In a message to mark the day which commemorates the abolition of slavery in the British Empire on August 1, 1838, Pierre described the anniversary as one of the most significant, if not the most significant event in our history when 13, 285 people from 384 plantations here were freed from slavery. However he expressed the view that in the past, the commemoration of Emancipation Day has not received the importance
