Chief Minister and Minister of Finance, Hubert Hughes, expressed concern that the British Government was allegedly withholding financial support for a CDB loan for the Anguilla Community College building, as one of the conditions for his signing the Framework for Fiscal Responsibility policy.
Responding to that, Professor Delroy Louden, President of the Anguilla Community College, is hoping that the way would soon be cleared so that the two million US dollar loan from the Caribbean Development Bank could be released, as soon as possible, to enable the construction work to proceed.
“As I said to you before, we are bursting at the seams right now at the college,” Professor Louden told The Anguillian. “We are offering Electrical Installation a programme in the Care of the Elderly; several computer programmes – Graphics Art & Design and so on. We are full at the seams here and are trying to meet some of the Ministry of Education needs for training. This includes non-traditional teachers – that is teachers who have baccalaureate degrees but not in teacher education and training. We are providing a Postgraduate Diploma programme which started since last September and is going very well.
“But we can’t house everybody under one roof. We have to house some of them at the Teachers’ Resource Centre with the kind help of the Department of Education. So we are running out of space in trying to meet some of the demands, and we would rely very greatly on the adjunct faculty – a number of young professional men and women in Anguilla – who give up their time to teach some of these courses for us…”
While lamenting the limited space in which the college was operating, Professor Louden said: “I have no doubt that our young people will do us proud in the long run. They just need some extra help from us and we should speak with one voice when it comes to education.”
Asked what the position was regarding the CDB loan for the Community College, he replied: “As I understand it, the money has been approved – and what it is subject to is the signing of the Framework for Fiscal Responsibility. I hope that that impasse between the budget and the Government of Anguilla can quickly be settled because CDB has had that money for sometime; and it is at a particular rate which is favourable to the Government of Anguilla. We simply cannot miss the opportunity for getting those funds as quickly as possible.
“We have now done all the requirements by CDB. They wanted the survey done; they wanted approval of the building; they wanted to see the quantity surveying reports; and we paid substantial sums of money to have all these prepared and sent to them.
“On our part, as the Board of the College, we have presented all the necessary documentation and the title of the property is in the name of the college.”
