United Progressive Party

The United Progressive Party (UPP) is a political party in Antigua and Barbuda. It has been one of the two major parties in the country (along with the Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party) since its first election in 1994. It is usually identified as centre-left. The party receives most of its support from suburban and rural Antiguan voters in the Central Plain and around the Shekerley Mountains. The party is allied with the Barbuda People's Movement and thus does not field candidates on Barbuda.

The party traces its origins to the Antigua Caribbean Liberation Movement (ACLM), the Progressive Labour Movement (PLM) and the United National Democratic Party (UNDP). Prior to the rise of the UPP, the Progressive Labour Movement, previously the main opposition party, had been in crisis for several years. The party had been subject to unfair electoral conditions and a rising threat from the UNDP. The ACLM was a minor socialist opposition party led by Tim Hector, backed by the Communist Party of Cuba and formerly by the New JEWEL Movement in Grenada. The UNDP, led by Baldwin Spencer, received a third of the votes in 1989, and won one seat.

The UPP was formed by merging those three parties on 11 April 1992, prior to the general election in 1994. Spencer was selected as leader, and campaigned on government transparency and the failures of the Bird family–dominated government. The party won five seats in 1994 and over 40% of the popular vote. The ABLP's leader Lester Bird consolidated power throughout the 1990s, eventually establishing a de facto one-party state, condemned by Freedom House as one of five non-electoral democracies in the Americas. Under this system, the UPP was subject to media censorship and electoral interference.

Following condemnation from various international institutions, including the Commonwealth of Nations, Bird's government established the Antigua and Barbuda Electoral Commission in 2001, paving the way for the first free elections in multiple decades in 2004. These elections were won by the UPP, with Spencer being elected as the first opposition prime minister since independence. Spencer campaigned on transparency, anti-corruption, infrastructural improvements, and decentralisation. His premiership improved the country's reputation overseas, and the party won the 2009 election as well. Fallout from the arrest of Allen Stanford and the global financial crisis contributed to the party's loss in 2014.

The party has been in opposition since 2014. Harold Lovell was elected leader of the party in 2015, and under his tenure the party suffered a landslide loss in 2018, with Jamale Pringle winning the sole seat. However, discontent with the government following numerous corruption scandals, tensions in Barbuda, and the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic caused the party to nearly return to government in 2023. Lovell resigned on 20 January 2023 following the slim loss, with Pringle being elected leader of the party on 21 April 2024. While the Alfa Nero scandal initially proved beneficial for the UPP's popularity, an ensuing credibility crisis caused by discontent with Pringle's leadership and consecutive by-election losses resulted in major resignations, most notably that of MP Anthony Smith in the prelude to the 2026 general election, a landslide loss for the party.