No loan guarantee, but UK favours COI technical assistance
Governor John Rankin has confirmed that the $400 million loan guarantee previously offered by the United Kingdom (UK) in the aftermath of hurricanes Irma and Maria are now off the table for the BVI.
The Governor gave that indication while speaking on the Talking Points radio programme recently after he was asked whether his office planned to support efforts to reinstitute the loan guarantee offer from the UK government.
Much of the discourse over the election campaign period centred on the BVI’s need to improve its crumbling infrastructure. But without the necessary funding, the government could be left hamstrung in trying to deliver on its promises in that area.
While declining to give specifics or any indication as to whether this is something the UK will move to assist the territory with, Governor Rankin said the subject may well have been broached during talks at the recently held Joint Ministerial Council (JMC) in the UK.
The Governor acknowledged that there is an urgent need for infrastructure improvements to be completed and said he was just as keen as any other resident to ensure that there is an approach that can be found to have this initiative moved forward.
Reviews need to be considered
In the meantime, Governor Rankin suggested that the UK may be inclined to support the BVI by providing further technical assistance to the government as it looks to complete the current suite of Commission of Inquiry (COI) recommended governance reforms.
The Governor reiterated that fewer than half of the nearly 50 COI reform recommendations have been implemented thus far, but confirmed that technical assistance had previously been sought by the BVI government, and granted by the UK in an effort to move the process along.
“There certainly have been requests made for technical assistance, which… the UK government is happy to provide where it can,” Governor Rankin stated. “Fewer than half of the COI recommendations have been implemented and we’re now, almost a year down the line.”
The Governor shared that, in some instances, all that has happened so far is that COI-recommended reviews have been produced for some areas of concern. “What we need to now get on with is actually considering the contents of the reviews, consulting on them as necessary, and then implementing them,” he added.
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Imagine the UK came with ships with body bags after Irma thinking we were done with and they did not offer the BVI grants or aid but a loan guarantee where the BVI gets the loan from a financial institution they stipulated and have to pay it back in the time of crisis and for the guarantee one of the many conditions would have been they control the BVI budget & economy while they gave millions of dollars of grant funding to other Caribbean countries who are not part of the OT. This was disguised as help but it really was just another well organized takeover plot. You can never take your eyes off the Governor & his bosses as it is never in no other best interest than theirs.
The UK has a foot on the BVI neck
The majority of BVI people are 100% for good governance but the Governor thinks the people of the BVI and the OTs are stupid. The UK at all times have to guarantee all loans by any OT so the loan guarantee after Irma was an attempt to take advantage of the BVI during a disaster through the unreasonable conditions attached to this mysterious LOAN GUARENTEE. Since that plan did not work as planned, they put all they wanted to do then in the COI recommendations now where some of those recommendations are not in the best interest of the people of the BVI coupled with the unreasonable & unrealistic implementation and deadlines. The Governor has failed miserably in all areas under their responsibilities for the last 40 years especially in the public service. They are now using this COI to cover up their failures and another attempt to try to put in place their ongoing plan attempt to direct rule through the latest strategy — THE COI. The BVI needs to wake up and see what they are really up to. The Governor is sowing seeds of discord in a diplomatic way, but God will stop him and them. BVI and all OT will prevail as long as they stay together and do the right things by the people.
Did he just hear the police say they are limited on resources? Is he not the man in charge of nation security? Does he plan to focus on national security? COI technical assistance from the UK? This country has become a mockery, a laughing stock.
That UK loan guarantee was just another move to try and control the BVI.
BVI could have had a long term infrastructure facility at historic low interest rates to rebuild our schools, roads. sewerage, potable water, power, alternative energy infrastructure. Instead we are struggling to get basic projects completed. This does not have anything to do with the UK, or colonialism, its simple stupidity on behalf of the politicians who focused on their own greed and illegal activities..
Once the infrastructure needs are identified and there is an actual budget identified and potential contractors’ bids submitted the UK will likely help make it happen in some fashion. But give a 400 million loan guarantee and we’ll have a new airport, ferry terminals, and other new capital projects and still have a ruined infrastructure. The reason the BVI has no borrowing power is because previous administrations ignored the infrastructure in favour of bragging rights over new capital projects, leaving us where we are today.
The UK wants to put us in further debt. Forget the 400 Million guarantee. Then they will put disaster on us like some did to Haiti. We are on to their tricks. Long live the BVI without ropes around our necks from the UK to hang us financially. We don’t trust them.
Shabba Rankin Cousin: “I guess we must hire all UK professionals to help. This should make me look good to my boss as I am helping to decrease the unemployment rate in the UK.”
Sl**ande: “Whatever you say boss. I’ll just look a little angry for the camera but I agree with you, Gov. I’ll just get my brother, I mean my special envoy, to give a speech”
What exactly is here that he UK allegedly wants so badly that it has to resort to the kind of subterfuge suggested in your comment to take the place over? Some might wonder why the UK even wants to hang on to the place.
What about all the elected BVI politicians over the decades? Do they not bear any responsibility for the state of the Territory? Every major project late and over budget, missing/waste public monies, shoddy work, no accountability, and the UK should just hand out money willy nilly thinking they’ll get repaid? Might have been a different story had there been less cronyism and corruption, all evident from reading the paper.
@NDP Supporter, The UK didn’t off any help in the line of money but helped us in so many ways; you are ungrateful just like the government. The UK knew how much money the BVI makes and they know how much money goes unaccounted for. The Caribbean countries who received help from the UK are worse off than the BVI. If the loan was accepted I agree with them in wanting to control the BVI budget & economy until the load was paid back because if they didn’t do that the money would have been gone without much been don’t and that’s a fact so stop talking crap.
I not bashing the Governor because most of the recommendations in the COI are needed but at the same time the stuff he’s directly responsible for not run much better. The prisoners up there in big chain drinking rum and smoking weed and the police complaining that they lack resources to police properly but he pushing for police laws that violate our rights instead.
The UK need a foot up them ra**!
They want to control but they don’t want to assist muchless invest.
Drink water and mind we business. Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhit!
@Good Riddance
Weather you know it and don’t accept it or you don’t know it we are owned by the UK and if they have good reasons to take over the BVI there isn’t thing you can do about it. So far most of you who are blogging on this article are a bunch of racist. In the first term of the new VIP Premier Andrew Fahie and Natalio Wheatley called down the UK every chance they got, now Fahie is in jail and Natali Wheatley is Premier he and the UK are best of friends from his point of view. Natali Wheatley name doesn’t worth the paper it’s written on.
And why would BVI need to receive $400m for re-build when the Government revenues paid in since the 1980s come to billions? One of the reasons Irma did so much damage was because so much in the BVI was jerry built and uninsured. How so when when billions of revenue came in?
Did no one watch the CoI? If that was not a justification for the proposed loan guarantee having conditions attached, I don’t know what is.
So, we didn’t accept the UK conditions and did without a High School for 5 years instead. Roads still terrible, no incinerator and intermittent, expensive electricity.
$400m aint the kind of money uk guarantee. we waste so much so long and you wanna wine to daddy who gave you freedom to run thing and where you take ship? to bottom.how much rocks bvi gov have to hit before voters look another pool of captains. wit skill.
ENGLAND IS A B**CH. THEY SUNG ABOUT IT SINCE 1977
If that UK loan guarantee money didn’t come with such strict conditions it would have just gotten thrown away and handled irresponsibly just like the 40 million they take from Social Security. We would have just ended up stuck paying back a loan after our leaders waste the money handing it out to their friends and supporters through overvalued and or completely unneeded contracts.
Is because we couldn’t figure out how to steal the loan money is the only reason we refuse it. Y’all really blame the UK for not trusting BVI government with more grant money to waste?
Help them implement the changes that need to change so they have no excuse to drag their foot and blame it on resources.
the BVI itself is the cause of most of its problem than the UK, and that would never change until we start accepting the truth
I agree with the loan Guarantee we need to know exactly what the money will be used for. I don’t understand what kind of Government Engineer or Engineers period we have in the BVI,they just destroy the Althea Scatliffe school which could have been repaired.All over the world structures are gutted and renovated by engineers. Now the Government will be looking for moneys to build a new school. I guess they have a source in mind.
ROADS INFRASTRUCTURE:If we are to have our Roads improved we need proper Engineering, and Road should be design base on the weight of the vehicles.also there is need to pay a road tax base on the weight of the vehicle which will go direct to Road Maintenance.
When Rankin and Collins and Pam leaving the vi
thanks for clearing it up / that midnight dude with the blonde WIG is who blogging all 5his racial lyrics , using different names and different web sites , the same web sites that he has criticized , I think the devil has his hands on him ? / and especially since he got blasted out of his play pen ( the HOA
I am well aware of the structure of the UK and the OTs. For your information, the UK has been trying to destabilize BVI Gov’t since the 1990’s. Which other OT has the “AT-Large system” embedded in its constitution and political system? At-Large was just supposed to be a trial run but eventually was injected into our society! Wheel and come again with your nonsense! The UK narrative and agenda are in full force through the CoI and by extension the threat of Direct Rule. It is all about power and control!
@ Resident
Don’t forget that the CDB loan money, courtesy of the NDP is finished or almost finished. I think a portion was set aside for the west end ferry terminal, which we scarcely get an update on these days.
They didn’t secure any other loan funding. So this budget year will be very interesting.
Thats why…they want what’s yours dummy.
The police resources come from the same budget that is approved by our Government. The police force in fact belongs to BVI. Ask our leaders to properly find the police force.
You must be god’s favourite idiot. There are 70,000,000 people in the UK. What difference can a tiny little island with 30,000 people on it make to the (un)employment numbers in the UK. The very small amount of people that are here from the UK are typically lawyers and accountants, some ex-police, and are here because they want to be, not to escape “unemployment”. Idiot!
When a person sees money and steals it, in stead of using it for food, do you give that person more money??
The government is not using tax money to fix broken infrastructure. They are “fixing Prospect Reef” and other nonsense.
This needs to be fixed. UK is smart not to loan money to a C***k head.
*’UK the Uk
Those accounts finished yet? The UK wanted the accounts form the Government in 2017 but apparently they had not been prepared for years – have they been finished and are they public?
The Govt not serious about the recommendations. Their Focus is to have power, be in charge. Civil servants are not taking instructions from these politicians, these politicians in power now has no control over staff. Staff still doing what they want. Hence the Territory needed Ronnie, but Ronnie messed it up..