Local News

After five years on the Bench as Resident High Court Judge in Anguilla, Justice Janice George-Creque, has left the island and has assumed the elevated position as an Appeal Court Judge based in St. Lucia.

Twenty two representatives from social service agencies and other community minded individuals are participating in a one week “Train the Trainers” workshop from Monday January 12th to Friday January 16th, 2009.

If all goes well, as planned, there will be a solution in the near future to the difficulty of full airlift from Puerto Rico into Wallblake Airport, Anguilla. At present, American Eagle, having cut back its operations, is providing only one flight at night to the island. This is hampering travel to Anguilla from key tourism markets on the United States mainland, the Puerto Rican market and is also affecting Anguillian travellers.

The people of Anguilla will get a new insight into their history with the imminent publication of the book Bless Our Forebears written by Colville L. Petty, an authority on Anguilla’s history. The launching will take place at the Teachers’ Resource Centre in The Valley at 7:00 pm on Tuesday 13th January 2009. It is an occasion to which all members of the general public are invited to attend.

More than 500 people crowded St. Augustine’s Anglican Church to capacity on January 3 for one of two Memorial Services bidding farewell to Anguillian Pilot and Aircraft Mechanic, Ken A. Webster. He died along with two passengers when his plane, traveling from Beef Island, Tortola, crashed in a rainforest in Puerto Rico on December 3, 2008.

Former Science Teacher at the Albena Lake-Hodge Comprehensive School, the late Yvonne Francois Harrigan-Thomas, originally of East End, was accorded much commendation for her fortitude, dedication and quality of life at a Thanksgiving Service held at the Central Baptist Church at Rey Hill on January 3.

Inspector Andrew Arsenault of the Financial Investigation Unit of the Royal Anguilla Police Force announced the arrest of a prominent businessman on the island on Wednesday morning this week, January 7.

While the island had been relatively quiet in various respects over the past two weeks or so, Police in Anguilla reported on Wednesday that there was an increase in the number of burglaries in several locations.

Christmas has come and gone and the New Year has dawned, both finding Ivy Frett-Carty and other occupants at North Side with an uninhabitable burnt-out home.

On Tuesday, January 6, the Business Department of the Albena Lake-Hodge Comprehensive School was the recipient of a multi-media projector.

Anguilla’s top Clergyman, The Rt. Reverend Errol Brooks, has taken up the position as Acting Archbishop of the Anglican Province of the West Indies with effect from January 1, 2009.

Anguilla’s Chief Minister, the Hon. Osbourne Fleming, held his first press conference for the New Year on Tuesday, January 6, with Minister of Finance, the Hon. Victor Banks and Minister of Social Development, Hon. Evans Rogers, also in attendance.

By: Colville Petty

Bless Our Forebears, the latest book by historian Colville Petty, traces the changing patterns of the socio-economic condition of Anguilla’s population. The author begins, as is customary, with the Arawaks who were succeeded by renegade Englishmen joined later by enslaved Africans with no personhood who themselves passed from that state to being independent peasant proprietors with nomadic practices.

The world has taken a financial downturn. As a result, many individuals are being affected significantly. My intention, in this three part series, is to help the every day (ordinary) person to manage successfully what he or she earns. In this first presentation, I will address the matter of debt from an every day (layman’s) perspective and not from a business viewpoint.

Caribbean Cable Communications will be moving at the end of February from its present location in rented accommodation into its own new corporate building higher up the road at George Hill, overlooking the ocean view across to St. Martin/St. Maarten.

Patrick Webster took the visiting couple, Mr. & Mrs. Ridgeway, from Southern Illinois fishing in the far deep, twenty miles to the north offshore Anguilla. Mr. Ridgeway, Brett, announces to Patrick that he would like to catch a mess of fish upon shoving off from the Island Harbour pier.

This little boy, Kenrick Gumbs, 8, could have been dead if it were not for the Grace of God.

Wallblake Airport came alive during the Christmas and New Year holiday season with another record-breaking number of private executive jets roaring in and out Anguilla.

Long time visitors to Anguilla, Mr. Rob Sharp and Mr. Gregg Weinstein, are two examples of what the holiday season should be all about. Both gentleman have agreed to donate a large sum of money to Project Stingray as they admire and believe in the dedication to the development of children shown by Caribbean Music Icon Bankie Banx and the staff and volunteers of Stingray. To provide some background on the project, the following information was extracted from their website.

Nineteen-year-old Leriano Webster, one of Anguilla’s brilliant graduates of the Albena Lake-Hodge Comprehensive School, left the island this week to pursue a four-year course of studies in Theology, in the Ministry of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, at the Southern Caribbean University in Trinidad.