(First published in The Anguillian on 11th June 2004.)
I join my compatriots in welcoming Governor Alan Huckle and his charming wife, Helen, to Anguilla and wish them both a rewarding stay among us. I am heartened by the Governor’s watchwords with respect to his tenure here: consultation and transparency.
Chief Minister Osbourne Fleming expressed delight that the Governor is a religious man. People will no doubt expect to see him in church regularly. I think the reason why Government requested a “religious” Governor is that it was of the view that a Christian society should have a Christian Governor; and thus avoid the kind of unfortunate situation which occurred in the early 1990s when Governor Alan Shave rode his bicycle through a Palm Sunday procession. I recall Hubert Hughes (1994) raising hell: “I am not happy to keep silent with a Governor who does not respect the culture of the Anguillian people which is a Christian culture . . . A Governor who does not believe in God cannot tell the truth. A Governor who does not believe in God cares nothing of humanity. A Governor who would ride his bicycle through a Palm Sunday parade shows total disregard and disrespect for the civilized nature of the Anguillian people.”
Governor Huckle is not of that stock and should have a quiet stay here mainly because the United Front Government is basically conservative. But if the AUM was in power he could have expected gale force winds. Its leader, Hubert, is a radical. Actually, I heard him boasting at the AUM meeting, at West End on Thursday 27th May, that the serious heart complications which Governor Robert Harris developed during his tenure in Anguilla was the result of the pressure which he, as Chief Minister, had put on him. He shouted: “I almost sent [Governor] Harris away in a [body] bag.”
Governor Huckle has come at a time when many progressive thinkers in Anguilla are calling for a greater degree of self-rule, and it is my hope that he throws his weight behind them. He has also come at a time when general elections are around the corner and campaigning is getting underway.
I was at the AUM meeting at West End when Hubert explained that Albert Hughes (Belto) was expelled from the AUM because its members wanted intellectual representation. He said that “the same people” who were complaining that he sacked Belto had been asking for years: “When will West End get a qualified representative?”
Hubert was adamant that he had nothing to do with Belto’s expulsion – that it was the decision of a party cell. It had concluded that Belto was intellectually deficient. As Hubert told the BBC Caribbean Service, a few days ago, “A significant cell in his (Belto’s) constituency . . . thought that they needed to upgrade the intellectual content of their representation . . .” and expelled him.
Hubert’s explanation made it sound as though Belto is a dunce. But even if he was a dunce he was a very good one because he always put the interests of his constituents first.
And not only that. Belto worked hard, over the years, in support of the AUM. I remember him, during the 1994 elections campaign, pleading to people to vote for the tree, the AUM’s electoral symbol. I could still hear him saying: “The AUM’s symbol is the tree. And every one of us here knows how important a tree is because if you have a mango tree you can go and can pick that mango and say how sweet it is. You have your coconuts trees – you can get your jellies to revive you and you know how sweet it is.”
Well Belto’s days of eating mangoes and coconuts from the AUM’s tree are over. His replacement, Walcott Richardson, a teacher of longstanding and a powerhouse of a speaker, made his first public appearance in the lead up to the 2005 elections at the AUM meeting at West End. He was his usual eloquent self. Confident and fearless, he declared: “I am contesting the West End seat!” Believe me, I just can’t imagine how pious, humble and rain water Belto is going to fare against Walcott whose initials spell WAR.
Walcott sought to deal quickly with those persons who were saying that because he was resident in St Maarten for many years, he had no business coming to Anguilla to contest elections. He had a very apt response. He pointed out that several of Anguilla’s political leaders spent many years living abroad. And listed them: “Ronald Webster resided in St Maarten. Hubert Hughes lived in England. Albelto Hughes . . . came out of St Thomas. Banks . . . the United States. [David] Carty, Jamaica . . . Your Attorney General – hails from Guyana.” The crowd applauded.
He then went on to stress: “Walcott is not an issue!” But that the issues were jobs, education, health, sports and recreational facilities, the loss of the trans-shipment, airport development, Anglec, removal of roadside water standpipes, the giving away of Sombrero’s fishing grounds to the British Virgin Islands, the corrupt 10% up front, the golf course and income tax. He did not go into detail but concentrated instead on the health hazard posed by the mushrooming of cell-phone transmitters all across the island. He warned about the dangers of “radiation sickness” and that the “health risks far surpass the economic benefits.”
Impressed with Walcott’s presentation, AUM Chairman Felix Fleming remarked that he was “a man with fire in his belly.” So true. Let us assume for a moment that he wins his seat but, say, ends up on the Opposition side of the House. Well I could tell you that whichever government is in power it would have its hands full because Walcott ain’t easy. He will demand answers, accountability and transparency.
Other speakers, at the AUM meeting, whose contributions were issue-oriented, were Teacher George, Iwandai and Davis Smith. But for Hubert, he seems obsessed with eliminating Edison Baird (Eddy), the new Leader of the Opposition in the House, from Anguilla’s political stage. He said that Eddy had “never functioned as a Minister in [his] Government. He was either over at the Herbert’s bar or in my office, or some other office, pulling his beards or playing with his necktie as an infant.” He referred to him as a “political mongrel” and as “a bad, rude baby” whom he tried to make “something of” but failed. Alluding to the fact that Eddy was well educated, Hubert observed that, “You can take the pig out of the mud, but you cannot take the mud out of the pig.”
He threw some very low punches at Eddy whom he said had not finished his house thereby setting a bad example to young people. Hear him: “Why is Mr Baird running about this island like a lil’ crazy boy and don’t look at the example he is showing the young people in having four walls [his ‘unfinished’ house] up there on a hill . . . and does nothing about it.” As if to rub salt in the wound, he said that “every little boy put up a block everyday” to finish his house but Eddy does nothing.
Hubert even made a connection between his replacement as Leader of the Opposition (by Eddy) and Eddy’s house. Listen: “They said that ‘I said that he Eddy Baird is anxious to get the extra money, as Leader of the Opposition, to finish his house.”’ To the contrary, I have read in the papers, and heard over radio, that Eddy is donating his Leader of Opposition monthly allowance (of EC$1,000) to charity. It means that he will not be buying a single concrete block with it.
In an apparent attempt to drive a wedge between Eddy and Anne Edwards, who is planning to contest his Road North seat, Hubert alleged that when Eddy heard she was running he said that she was only running “to lose weight.”
Eddy is being savaged badly by Hubert all because the two of them are now on opposite sides of the political divide. During the 1999 political impasse, Eddy refused to follow Victor Banks’ lead in abandoning Hubert’s Government. He told his supporters: “I am not going to jump out of a plane without a parachute.” He did not jump without the parachute and Hubert exalted his name. He told the Press (on 2nd July 1999) that Eddy was “too clean to stay in the ADP [with Victor] . . . The boy is too clean and too brilliant and he’s going to be an outstanding politician.” He boasted: “Eddy . . . is one of the best political brains in Anguilla.”
Today, Hubert is saying that Eddy is a political failure who cannot even finish his house. And Eddy’s supporters are saying that he should have jumped out of Hubert’s plane long ago – parachute or no parachute. Eddy now stands alone. Parachute-less. And is being attacked from all sides.
Eddy is also being attacked by Haydn Hughes who is contesting the Road North seat. Actually, Haydn seems not to be living up to a promise he made, at Blowing Point on 6th May, to conduct a campaign “based on facts, not rhetoric; issues not innuendo; substance not verbal garbage.” He did not come across that way when I heard him saying at West End: “The member for Road North [Eddy] . . . is an evil liar full of envy and jealousy.”
But the worse was yet to come. Haydn called the member for Road North “a nasty, blaspheming, unthankful, disloyal, slanderous, fierce liar, who is puffed up with an ego and lacks any substance.” And up to now my ears have not stopped ringing. If they are damaged Haydn will have to pay my medical bill. I do not know what has poisoned, so badly, relations between him and Eddy, but Hubert may have given some hint of the reason for his son’s anger. To quote him: Eddy was “walking about saying that my son, Haydn, owes Government $64,000 for water, when Haydn has the biggest cistern for a single man [in] any part of South Hill.” Hubert said that his son “never had a water line. He doesn’t need it” because his cistern was always full of water. As he put: “I could dip Haydn’s water with a bowl, any day.”
After savaging Eddy so badly – after dragging him through the mud – Hubert caused much laughter when he said that, “Mr Baird has dragged us in the mud and we will not be dragged.”
Well more mud-dragging, or mud-slinging, will follow because you could bet your last dollar that Eddy will not allow Hubert and Haydn to get away unscathed. Not Eddy. Reason? Hear it from Hubert’s own lips (1999): “Eddy . . . is one of the best political brains in Anguilla.”
Hubert should also expect some heavy flak from Alan Gumbs who is going up against him in Road South. We got a sample of what is likely to happen when Alan was the guest on Talk Your Mind on 19th May. Hubert called the programme to dispute some of the things he (Alan) was saying and Alan told him that he was “very good at telling us about everything that is wrong” but that if he wanted to get elected he will need to “talk about what he can do for the future.” Alan did not stop there. He seemed to have wounded Hubert’s pride when he told him that when his government was in power he did nothing about constitutional reform and the labour law; he destroyed the trans-shipment business and the first golf course project; and he did not produce a new airport.
But yer know something? While the opposition forces are tearing at each other’s throat the United Front Government is laughing – is enjoying the ‘fun’. The opposition forces are so swallowed up in a campaign of self-destruction that they have no time to assess or criticise Government’s performance and policies or address the real issues affecting the welfare of the Anguillian people. Somehow one gets the impression that the Opposition is campaigning for the Government.
In Road North, Rhona Richardson does not need to campaign. Why should she? Hubert and Haydn are doing it for her. Free. They are slaughtering Eddy. If they continue along that vein, all that Rhona has to do, after elections, is use some of her excess campaign funds and buy a good wreath and put on his tombstone. She could even leave a little note saying: “Cousin Eddy, it wasn’t me. It was Hubert and Haydn.”
If the opposition forces as a whole continue along that vein then they “are spinning top in mud.” And if they are serious about forming the government in 2005 they got to mend their divisions and settle their differences now rather than later. According to Pastor Ambrose Richardson (1993): “You don’t wait until your foot has gangrene to find a cure.”
