News

The two-month-old Anguilla United Movement Government returned to the Rodney McArthur Rey Auditorium on Tuesday evening for its second well-attended public consultation, this time on the 2010 budget proposals – three days before formal presentation in the House of Assembly on Friday.

Chief Minister of Anguilla, the Hon. Hubert Hughes, has made a passionate plea to the island’s Chamber of Commerce and Industy to assist the Government with the creation of jobs and other important opportunities which should be reserved for nationals. He made the call in a feature address he delivered to the private sector body at its 6th Annual General Meeting at DaVida Restaurant at Crocus Bay on Tuesday, April 13.

A three-hour fashion show, put on by Runaway Anguilla, a group of hardworking community persons, was a memorable event by which they raised well-needed funds to help finance the Workshop Initiative for Support in Education (W.I.S.E.)

The third Annual Festival Del Mar on the weekend of April 3 and 4 has been described as a success by the organising committee and by many of those who witnessed and enjoyed the event. The organisers are a community-based group of persons, under the chairmanship of the Hon. Othlyn Vanterpool, working in conjunction with residents of the fishing village, and the Anguilla Tourist Board which is assisting with its promotion.

Anguilla’s Revolutionary Leader, James Ronald Webster, is still savouring the red carpet ceremony and motorcade laid out for his arrival home from St. Croix, where he had been for the past five weeks for his usual medical check up and rest.

A strong force in singing to reckon with, particularly at Christmas and Easter festivals, St. Augustine’s Chorale took centre stage on Easter Sunday in another of its professional presentations before a large and appreciative audience.

Island Harbour Bay will be a packed scene of activity this weekend, when the customary annual Festival Del Mar events will be showcased in a burst of cultural splendour, attracting hundreds of persons from throughout the island.

The newly-appointed members of the Anguilla Tourist Board, who have been meeting informally at Sheriva Boutique Hotel since their selection, were formally inaugurated on Wednesday evening at the Board’s Office Building in The Valley.

The new Executive Council moved quickly on March 11 to give approval to two pieces of social development legislation which will ultimately assist with the release of long-serving prisoners who show remorse for their criminal conduct and a desire to reform. To some extent, the legislation is expected to ease the problematic overcrowding at the prison. The measures, which were pending and publicly discussed during the previous Government, are the Parole Bill and the Probation Bill which will go before the House of Assembly shortly, having already been introduced there last year.

It was just on 22nd March 2010 conveyed to Reverend Gumbs’ Solicitors in London that on 10 March 2010 the Privy Council have adjudged that in relation to the matter of whether legal and other costs ought to be awarded to Reverend Gumbs, their Decision is that Reverend Gumbs is to be awarded the costs of the cases in the Privy Council and also costs in the High Court and Court of Appeal to be assessed if not agreed.

The people of Anguilla have been given an insight into the difficult financial position of the island (see follow-up statement elsewhere in The Anguillian) and various matters relating to the functioning of the Ministers of Government, since the election to office of the Anguilla United Movement Administration.

Many of the figures contained in the statement regarding the financial position of Anguilla, circulated at the Government’s public forum at the Rodney MacArthur Rey Auditorium on Thursday, March 11, have been refuted by Leader of the Opposition, Evans McNiel Rogers, who was a Minister in the previous United Front Government.

His Excellency Alistair Harrison, Governor of Anguilla, announced on Tuesday, March 9 that, on the unanimous recommendation of the Judicial Service Commission he has approved the appointment of Ms Ivenia Benjamin as Senior Magistrate. Ms Benjamin is a citizen of the Commonwealth of Dominica. She has experience there of working as magistrate, in the Attorney-General’s Chambers and in private practice. She will be taking up her position in early April.

The National Bank of Anguilla, now celebrating its 25th Anniversary, and the Organisation of Early Childhood Education, observing a month of activities, were largely represented by their banking staff and teachers respectively, at the worship service at the Seventh-day Adventist Church on Saturday, March 6.

Almost 43 years after he led the 1967 Anguilla Revolution, which culminated in the island’s formal separation from St. Kitts-Nevis in 1980, James Ronald Webster was honoured with a public holiday filled with a spectacular series of social and cultural events on his 84th birthday on Tuesday this week. The morning and afternoon celebration, in recognition of his revolutionary and fearless leadership of Anguilla, will be an annual event. Mr. Webster, who was not in attendance, was reported by Chief Minister, Hubert Hughes, to have been at an “undisclosed location.” Reports stated however that he had left the island for his customary visit to St. Croix, US Virgin Islands.

This Friday, March 5, is exactly one week since the commencement of a new House of Assembly in Anguilla, occasioned by the swearing in of the island’s first female Speaker, the Elected Members, the First Nominated Member and the two Ex-Officio Members, the Deputy Governor and the Attorney General. The Second Nominated Member is yet to be announced and sworn in.

The Deputy Governor of Anguilla, the Hon. Stanley Reid, has sent a letter to the Supervisor of Elections, Mr. Colville Petty OBE, expressing appreciation and commendation for the efficient and timely manner in which he conducted the election process.

The letter, dated 22nd February 2010, reads as follows:

Mr. Jerome Roberts, a member of the Anguilla Progressive Party, who was elected to serve as the representative of District 2 (East End/Sandy Hill) in the General Election on February 15, has decided to take his seat on the Opposition Bench in the Anguilla House of Assembly.

After a protracted and gruelling General Election campaign, the people of Anguilla voted for a change of Government on February 15, 2010. The Anguilla United Front (AUF), which dominated the running of the island’s affairs for a decade, lost office to the main opposition party, the Anguilla United Movement (AUM), led by Hubert Hughes who previously headed the island’s Government from 1994 to 2000.

On 12th January 2010, Mr. Rosemond James, Director General of the Eastern Caribbean Civil Aviation Authority and Mr. Gregory Mc Alpin, ECCAA’s Director of Flight Safety traveled to Haiti to attend a meeting of the Caribbean Aviation Safety and Security Oversight System (CASSOS). They checked in to the Hotel Montana and later that afternoon, the hotel and much of Haiti’s capital, Port Au Prince, was destroyed by the earthquake which we now know has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives.