The Hon. James Ronald Webster envisioned a commercial, transatlantic airport for Anguilla. Like us today, he believed that Anguilla’s future development would benefit significantly. To that end, he secured lands in Bremegin for the same. He placed a stay on any residential and commercial development in the vicinity.
In 1984, Anguilla’s 2nd Chief Minister, Hon Emile Gumbs, together with the Minister of Infrastructure, Hon. Albena Lake-Hodge penned a letter to the Government of Taiwan asking for aid in developing the airport. The letter said, “We are a small island on the threshold of independence”. It went on to state that pre independence infrastructure is needed.
Anguilla’s 3rd Chief Minister who ironically worked with both Webster and Gumbs agressively pursued the airport. Chief Minister Hubert Hughes believed that we would never have the financial wherewithal to develop the sort of airport that Anguilla had the potential to have. His goal was to privatize and by 1999, he had secured an agreement with the French to develop the airport. Much work was done including studies and drawings. The costing was done and it looked promising but alas, the election of March 2000 ushered in the Banks/Bunton administration under a coalition situation.
Mr. Victor Banks Anguilla Democratic Party (ADP) and Mr. Osbourne Fleming’s Anguilla National Alliance (ANA) forged a United Front and immediately abandonned those plans. The rationale was that the French wanted to develop 4,000 hotel rooms over a period of 15 years which he said would mean an importation of upwards of 8,000 people. I challenged Mr. Fleming on this on Kool fm 103.3 back then and he told me I was too young to understand.
But between 2002 and 2008, the very same Anguilla United Front signed no less than 10 Memorandum of Agreements (MOA) to develop at least 4,380 rooms on island without an airport or even a meaningful seaport to move the residents and potential visitors and tourists back and forth.
Mr. Banks’ position on the airport was curious to me. Why? Because he was a Minister in Ronald Webster’s government, along with Mr. Fleming back when Webster was pushing for the airport. Mr. Banks was also an equal partner in the coalition government of 1994 – 1999 (AUM/ADP) when Hughes almost made a broke through on the airport. So why did he abandon that in 2000?
Mr. Banks’ argument for the short strip was not only based on a myth called exclusivity but he said to us that American Eagle was moving to the ATR72 and needed a longer strip. The project Manager was the Chairman of the AUF, Mr. Fritz Smith and there is a report speaking to the challenges of Corito due to the overmining of earth there. That report has been exposed but we the people chose to ignore.
To continue, Mr. Banks was absolutely opposed to a strip that could accomodate transatlantic commercial flights. This position was echoed by the Chair lady of the Anguilla Tourist Board, Ms Donna Banks in 2015 when she said in an interview on klass 92.9fm with Abner DjHammer that we must be realistic. She questioned which airline would want to come to Anguilla. Never mind she is an employee of the AASPA and the Minisrer of Ports is the Hon. Curtis Richardson who has made it clear that by 2020, Anguilla will have an airport that can accomodate direct commercial flights from Clayton J. Lloyd to New York and London. I happen to think its an impossibility to meet that dealine but it clearly shows a difference in views related to the much needed airport is prevailant.
When I was Parliamentary Secretary, I was told by Statchel Warner that I would be invited to a radio/TV talk show hosted by the senior advisor to the AUF and a former Permanent Secretary to Banks, Mr. Marcel Fahie. The other host was Mr. John Benjamin QC. I took up the offer.
Mr. Fahie questioned me on the rationale for my idea of the Anguilla/St. Maarten dock. I laid before him the reason why I pushed for it given the situation at hand. He asked me how much Government paid for the same. It was a little less than EC$1 million dollars but then I asked him about Mr. Banks and his rationale for the airport which was at the time facilitating approximately 8% of our visitor arrivals, losing over a million dollars a year and at the time, had cost us in excess of 80 million dollars to develop. The true cost is still not yet determined over a decade since it opened because we are still compensating individuals for their properties.
I put to him Mr. Banks’ rationale that the airport was expanded to accomodate the ATR72. To my surprise, Mr. Fahie responded by saying, “That’s not why it was done!” I was shocked because for over 10 years, we all believed what Mr. Banks said so I asked him why was it done then and, to this moment, he has refused to answer.
What I have said above is just a bit of our history. It is not only demonstrating to you the young people that youth views have been ignored for a long time – I would know because I too was once considered a young loud mouth from the early 90s, barely in my 20s. Note my challenge to Chief Minister Fleming in 2000 when I was still in my 20s but it also goes to show the lack of vision and the lost opportunities for our beloved island.
The plans for the international airport are still with the Ministry of Infrastructure and maybe they should be displayed at the Edison Hughes Library.
So I congratulate the government and people of St. Vincent for welcoming its first trans atlantic international flight. Whatever your opinion, I personally congratulate them for ensuring the vision of Prime Minister Ralph Gomslaves was realized. Your country will grow from strenght to strength because he was given the chance to see a vision realized.
Take a bow.
