THE BOMBSHELL article published last week in this newspaper by Don Mitchell painted the alarming position we are in. It is a reminder of what we have all known – and have regularly spoken about.
In the budget debate earlier this year, I warned of the pending gloom. The administration used their majority to ram their measures through and effectively to laugh at the warning. But while the very select few remain in their ivory towers, detached from the reality of suffering and the encroaching poverty, ordinary Anguillians are feeling the pain of their maladministration.
The sad fact is that of all the islands affected last year by a hurricane, Anguilla shows less prospects of making as strong a recovery as other jurisdictions, in time for the tourism season, even though initially it was among the ones that suffered less damage per capita.
The current administration has neither been bold enough nor creative enough – or perhaps competent enough – to lead the kind of recovery that we are in dire need of. This is also a reflection of the structural state of the local economy before the hurricane hit. The storm found us already more financially exposed than we should have been, thus compromising our ability to recover well. The Turks and Caicos government, for instance, had a surplus fund that allowed them to immediately start their rebuilding effort. Under the watch of this government – and also, to an extent, the previous one – the rest of Anguilla has been proverbially burning while the status quo fiddled.
And so this latest Don Mitchell article should be a national wakeup call. This is absolutely an emergency case.
This year the economy will decline further; unemployment is rising and we are amidst an exodus of our strongest and our brightest.
The one thing that has made this crisis not appear as bad as it is, is the fact that we are being somewhat shielded by being a member of the Eastern Caribbean currency union.
If we had our own currency it would have long been devalued in the face of our alarming debt levels, the shrinking of the economy and this ongoing recession.
Indeed we are the second smallest economy in the ECCU. At the end of 2017 we accounted for 4.7 percent of the Union’s total gross domestic product (GDP).
All sectors, except construction – giving the build-back activities after the hurricane – have been in decline.
Figures show that the contraction in 2017 reflected decreased activity in transport, storage and communications (11.8 percent) the hotels and restaurants (10.4 percent) and Wholesale and Retail trade (8.0 percent).
In essence the wheels of the economy have fallen off.
Further, there have also been declines in Real Estate, Renting and Business activities (0.8 percent) and Financial Intermediation (0.3 percent).
Indeed the current economic crisis is rooted not in the hurricane, as some would want you to believe, but in the financial mess we created before that.
Even more frightening is the fact that our people – many of our bright minds – are leaving in droves.
The hurricane just showed how exposed we are.
Long before Hurricane Irma, there was Hurricane Banks. The first one has long gone, the second one remains to our continued torment.
It must be noted that by the end of 2016 the debt stock increased to EC$551.84m. This represented a 159.4 percent increase (EC$212.71m) over the 2015 debt stock.
This increase was due primarily to the new debt contracted in support of the banking resolution exceeding scheduled amortization payments.
In 2017 the debt stock declined by 6.3 percent (EC$34.74m) over the 2016 debt stock level. Increase in external debt is as a direct result of a loan contracted from CDB to recapitalize the bridge bank in 2016. At the end of 2017, external debt stock stood at EC$193.27m.
The effective collapse of the local banking sector must be put at the foot of the government who had failed to enforce its own regulations; had refused to find ways to protect depositors’ money, and they have governed over an economy that contracted so fast, it forced well meaning borrowers to default on their loans.
Mismanaged banks were protected by the government – and no one has been made to account.
The political status quo is unable, or unwilling, or both, to take firm action.
But we as Anguillians just complaining about it is not enough. We must mobilize ourselves into action.
It is madness to expect that the people who have brought us to this place, could take us out of it.
That is why there is an urgent need for a new political construct – a united team of One Anguillians – that will “dis” the status quo in the hope of something better.
We are at the crossroads where despair meets opportunity. We together must seize the opportunity.
That’s why we have engaged in wide discussions with many stakeholders in our community; and many Anguillians at home and abroad.
Those discussions will continue; and we will invite many more to join us. Only dedicated patriots will save Anguilla.
As opposition leader, I have both a constitutional and moral responsibility to provide leadership in this period.
All personal interests must be out aside for the good of Anguilla; indeed for the redemption of our beloved Anguilla and for the future of our nation.
