Senior Opposition Member in the Anguilla House of Assembly, Hubert Hughes, turned up late at his press conference on Tuesday this week, and thanked reporters for their tolerance in waiting for him.

Hon. Hubert Hughes

“I was late due to the fact that I was doing quite a bit of constituency office work for which I am not paid because I understand my constituency allowance has been withdrawn,” he explained. “Nevertheless I continue to serve the island with Road South being a very important constituency I represent. But I also represent people at West End, Road North and all around the place. People come to me with problems created mainly by the Anguilla United Front Government which I must solve from day to day.”
Mr. Hughes, who was given a costly jeep earlier this year by the Government, initiated by Chief Minister, Osbourne Fleming, to assist him with his travels in his constituency and to help transport the people he represents, returned it to the Chief Minister’s Office a few months thereafter. It followed a call by him for other elected members to do the same as a result of the economic situation affecting the island.

Mr. Hughes said that the only reason he wanted back his jeep was that he had turned it in to be sold and for the money to be used for social development purposes such as to purchase medical supplies for the hospital as a subsidy. “The next day the Chief Minister went down to Public Works and put CMO on the jeep and five or six times a day I see him from my verandah just enjoying himself and all the privileges of being the Chief Minister, driving an expensive jeep all day long. That jeep should have been sold …and I think since that is the case, give me back my jeep.”

Mr. Hughes, who in the course of his delivery repeated a call for a general election, commented on suggestions from Government and other sources to reveal a recovery plan he said he had for the island so that the electorate could know what to vote for. “I do not have to outline my plan to a failed Government, a Government that has robbed so many of my ideas in the past,” he asserted. “I have plans which I will not release at this time.”

Mr. Hughes was told that the plans he had could not be achieved alone without the involvement of other people and that this was a time when people were out of work, were losing their cars and were in trouble with banks for their homes. As a consequence he was asked whether he thought that there was a need for everyone to come together politically to decide what should be done at a time when there was also some apathy to politics and elections on the part of the people.

“That is definitely not a consideration for me,” he replied. He said that for the past twenty years or more he had been calling for national government but even persons within his own party were opposed to the idea. “For me at this stage when elections are constitutionally due to talk about national government [would not be possible],” he went on. “We need national government at a time when the Chief Minister has already declared that he would no longer be contesting elections and we need national government when all this damaged has already been done. National government can only work if I lead it because I have never been a party political boy. I have always believed in nationalism…I have laid done the conditions for my participation in national government. I said that for me to join a national government, which I want, is to be given the Ministry of Finance. I could not conceivably do anything positive to make a difference if I did not hold the Ministry of Finance in a national government.”

Mr. Hughes, who said he stayed away from carnival because he could not be celebrating at a time of doom and crisis, said he was giving the Government up to the end of August to announce the timing for elections. “I look forward to their postponed opening of their convention and campaign which they hope to launch on the 12th and 13th of September,’ he stated, poking criticism at the party’s candidates. “If on the 12th and 13th of September, they do not announce a date for elections, then my campaign after that would be to enlighten, educate and prepare the people for a massive show of civil disobedience.”

He continued: “I can see one problem. Anguilla is the only place in the region, including St. Maarten, where the civil servants accept the type of humiliation that our civil servants accept. The Chief Minister boasted in the House of Assembly that even though the President of the civil service union is brave enough to stand up to the Government, he does not have any support from the rank and file of the civil service. I urge the civil servants to support their leader.”

Mr. Hughes complained that the names of a number of his supporters had been omitted from the electoral list. “I have to now go and conduct a registration exercise on my own which I asked the Attorney General to look into weeks ago and up to now I haven’t had any response,” he said. He added that he might have to go to court on the matter.

The Opposition Member was critical of the Anguilla delegation’s meeting in London, which he described as “an abortive trip.” He was of the view that the British Government would not be sympathetic to Anguilla because they always stressed that the island should not give away its tax revenue and was totally opposed to the lavish duty-free concessions to developers. He charged that this was one of the reasons for the tough talking to the delegation by the British officials.

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