Politics

All Members of the House of Assembly Form a United Front. Everyone in Anguilla is commenting on the current unity of interest being shown by the elected members of the House of Assembly. All seven of them appear regularly on public forums, sitting together and agreeing with one another. They appear to be singing in harmony from the same song sheet. It is not a phenomenon we are accustomed to. Normally, they bicker continuously among themselves.

Momentum is building up. Village and constituency meetings are being held all over the island. For the first time since the last elections, significant crowds of citizens are coming out to hear and support the speakers and panelists. A sort of election fever is heating up. The chorus of “full internal self-government” is now being sung loudly and clearly and in unison. The issue that is gaining everyone’s attention is opposition to continued rule over the island’s affairs by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. All the elected representatives are singing the same tune. Down with Orders in Council! Unity runs so high that bills and motions proposed by government representatives are taken up enthusiastically by members of the opposition. Not a word of opposition is heard, in or out of the House.

So, the question today is, what is happening?

Those of us who have been around for a few years will not have failed to notice that general elections are just around the corner. The House of Assembly’s life comes to an end in early 2010. Elections must be held by April of that year at the latest. What is a politician’s most powerful motive? To get reelected, of course! A popular platform is a sure help in this process. What better subject than “freedom from the foreign oppressor”? After all, it has proven successful in the past all over the world. The book is a best seller. It is a song the words of which are known by heart.

The FCO can be relied on to feed the fire. They have repeatedly stated that they will not entertain a move for full internal self-government, except within the framework of a short timetable for independence. Both government and opposition members of the House have stated that they are not interested in political independence for Anguilla at this time. There is no evidence of a widespread interest in the country for independence. The classic foundations for a dispute are forming up.

It was noticeable on Anguilla Day that the crowd in the stands sat stoically while the police band played the National Anthem. Only the dignitaries under their special tent felt obliged to stand up. The crowd in the stands only jumped to their feet when the tune of the National Song began. The evidence is clear. The message is sinking in. There is a common enemy we must unite against. And, thank God, they are foreigners! This is so much better for a country’s soul than an internal dispute and a fragmented nation!

It is going to be an uphill battle for the new crop of candidates. Not only do they have to struggle against the natural advantage enjoyed by the incumbents. The old war horses have begun to paint themselves as the radical patriots. Will the young and coming politicians find an alternative issue that can capture the imagination of the electorate? To have any hope of success in the coming struggle, they will have to find a platform of their own that will distinguish them from the present crop of representatives. They cannot be seen to oppose “full internal self-government”. That would be to tar themselves with the charge of lack of patriotism. A young politician does not win an election by swimming against the current.

What does it all mean? The next two years are going to be difficult ones for the relationship between the FCO and the Anguillian people. Turmoil is coming. What will be the long-term effect? Will our leaders be able to control it? Will they succeed in using the issue to win another term, and then let things calm down? Or, will matters get out of hand, and political excitement turn into civil unrest? That is not in the best interests of anyone of us trying to earn a living and pay our mortgage.

We shall just have to wait and see.

My Poppet Zola

I have recently become poppet-obsessed. I received the pattern from the wonderful Ghilieon Craftster and after spending some time collecting all the materials, went to work on my first poppet.I named her Zola, an Italian name meaning "earth". Her body is made of Alova Suede (great to work with!), with thrifted yarn in 2 colours for her hair, and silk leaves for her inner ear. Her eyes are from

My hand-y pincushion (with pattern and tute)

Here is the basic pattern for my hand-y pincushion as posted on http://www.craftster.org/http://www.mediafire.com/?eja2jmmhmmfTrace the pattern onto freezer paper and iron onto your fabric. Cut 2 of the hand and one of the end piece. Make sure right sides are facing, and it is time to sew!Sew all around hand leaving bottom open. Sew end piece to half of wrist area leaving it open, and turn right

Big Chief

Government by Laws Rather than by Men. Last Monday, on the Webster Park, during the public meeting to discuss the constitutional reform programme, I thought Brent Davis asked a perfectly reasonable question. I cannot remember his exact words, but it went something like this. He said, “We all know that, at present, if a contractor needs a work permit, and the Immigration Department is refusing it, all he has to do is to go and speak to the Minister personally. If he is a friend and supporter of the Minister, he will get the permit. If he begs hard enough. If he is not a friend, he will not get it. If any Anguillian wants to develop his land in a way the Land Development and Control Committee will not approve, all he has to do is to go to see the Minister. The Minister will tell his Permanent Secretary, who is the Chairman of the Committee, to approve it.”

Then, he asked, “How do you expect Anguillians to give you more power over us when you do not have a system in place that is transparent and applies equally to all?”

The Chief Minister responded instantly, and, it seemed, from the heart. He was obviously being honest and earnest. He said, “Brent, you know we are all politicians. Civil servants can sometimes be very hard and uncompromising. They do not show flexibility in appropriate cases. We politicians have a softer heart. We listen to our people. We sometimes have to step in and soften the decisions taken by our civil servants.”

My heart sank. The Chief had no idea how bad he sounded. He did not know that his response was the definition of one of the most corrupting systems of government in the world. It is government by big chief, instead of government by law. By defending the system that Brent had just described, he was showing that he was a supporter of it. At the very least, he did not recognise how dangerous and unacceptable it is to a modern, educated people such as the Anguillians of today.

In a democratic, transparent, accountable system of government, it is the duty of Ministers to lay down the national policy. Then, they have to leave it to the civil service to carry out their policy. For appropriate cases, they put in place a system of appeals to an independent board. There can never be allowed a personal appeal to the Minister to reverse an official's decision. The official has a duty to apply government's policy fairly and evenly across the board. To have it otherwise, means that the law and policy are not applied evenly and fairly to all citizens. Victimisation is the inevitable result.

If there is something wrong with the law or policy, change the law or policy. That is what the Ministers can do. That is their role and power. When society becomes accustomed to permitting Ministers to overturn official decisions for their friends and supporters, we begin the long downward slope to arbitrary and dictatorial rule.

The Chief Minister was not alone in not understanding this fundamental rule of fair government. Besides Brent, I doubt there were more than five persons in the crowd on the park that evening listening to that exchange who thought there was something strange about the Chief Minister's response. Most of them seemed to think his response was perfectly normal and correct. In their defence, it is the only system they have known in Anguilla all their lives. They have no knowledge of how government by law is done in other parts of the world.

In defence of our Ministers, it is also true that it is the people who corrupt their system of government. It is not the leaders who start off corrupt. Leaders sometimes come into power with honest and sincere intentions to do good for their people. We then go to visit them, and beg them for special favours. We offer them all sorts of inducements to grant our wish. Sometimes it is our vote, sometimes an envelope of money, sometimes sexual favours. Our leaders know that is how government works in other islands of the West Indies. The risk is that they may come to think it is normal. We live in fear that one day they may give in to the temptation.

We have been fortunate in Anguilla to have had, over the years, men and women in power who were decent and honest. They have stood up to and resisted the temptations. We have not suffered from the type of corruption that has affected so many of our neighbours. We really have been lucky!

Some will say that the island is too small to expect that the standards that exist in the outside world will survive and work here. They shrug their shoulders and say that only in a big country will there be newspaper journalists and radio talk-show hosts who will make it their mission to demand more integrity, transparency and honesty from our leaders. I say that is not true!

No matter how small our community, we are entitled to expect that government will be of law and not of men.

Checks & Balances

Checks and Balances. The United States Constitution is often touted as that which best demonstrates checks and balances on the power of the Executive. We have all seen the Senate Committees in action. The President nominates someone to be the next Chief Justice. That is the Executive influencing the Judiciary. There has to be a check and balance. The Senate Judiciary Committee must approve the President's nomination, or the person selected by the President cannot be appointed. That is the Legislature acting as a check on the power of the Executive. This is recognised and appreciated as one of the finest aspects of the US Constitution.

The US has a Presidential-style Constitution. We in Anguilla have what is called a Westminster-style Constitution. It is a written form of the unwritten rules that prevail at Westminster in London. One of the characteristics of a Westminster-style Constitution is that there are no checks and balances. The British traditionally left all that to individual honour and integrity. Parliament was then considered a gentleman's club. No Prime Minister could be thought to be acting improperly in making appointments! Now, even the British have given up on that mistaken theory. Prime Ministers need to raise large sums of money to get re-elected. Money greases the wheels of power everywhere. So, the British have begun to introduce checks and balances into their system. Today, in England, the Minister cannot appoint a crony to a Hospital Board, as used to be done in past years. An Appointments Commission, set up by law, must check credentials and background and approve all appointments to public boards in the UK.

Many of us in Anguilla have not woken up to the weaknesses and deficiencies in this area of our Constitution. We are not surprised when, after every general election, the Ministers divide up the statutory boards and national committees between themselves. One Minister might appoint incompetent but politically important supporters to the Social Security Board. Another Minister, by agreement, would take the Anglec Board. [No, I have no particular appointment in mind. I picked them at random as typical of appointments to all boards and committees over the years in Anguilla]. No one in Anguilla questions these appointments. We laugh, and call it “enjoying the fruits of office”, and think nothing more of it. In fact, it stinks of corruption, and should make us all ashamed of our governments, past and present.

If we are going to ask the people to support a push for increased internal self-government, we must show that it is balanced by checks on abuse of power. If as much thought is not put into checks and balances, then people will not support increased self-government. They will think, better to have arbitrary, one-man, government by the far-away British who seldom get in our face, than the same by an unchecked and unbalanced local politician who can, and will, delight in harming the interests of those of us he perceives as opposing his wishes and interests.

Recent history in the Caribbean has proven it ever to be so. And, they say we cannot learn from history?

Garden Path

Full Internal Self-Government. Young people don't beat around the bush. They come straight to the point. They asked, “Are you in favour of the Chief Minister telling the British Government that we demand our full internal self-government?” I told them, “No”. They asked, “So, you don't believe Anguillians are ready for full internal self-government?” I answered, “Yes, Anguillians are ready. On condition that there is a full safety-net of checks and balances. Better we deal with one hand tied behind our backs with the far-away British who do not interfere with our rights than we deal with two hands tied behind our backs with a government we may get one day that is malicious and spiteful.”

The problem is not with Anguillians running the various agencies of government. The question is, will the new Constitution contain all the checks and balances that the 2006 Constitutional and Electoral Reform Commission Report recommended? Until I see that done, I am very concerned that we will give away our present liberties and be taken advantage of by greedy men with no real interest in the welfare of their people.

The second reason why we should not demand full internal self-government at this time is strategic. The British government has no objection to us asking for full internal self-government. We will get it anytime we ask for it. They have told us so repeatedly. What they insist on is that we must come with a timetable for independence when we want to talk about full internal self-government. Nobody in Anguilla, nobody with any sense anyway, is in favour of independence in the foreseeable future.

We all know how fragile Anguilla's democracy is. It is of such a short duration that we have little or no experience in the many mechanisms of democracy. All the Leeward Islands, except Anguilla, had Legislatures since the Seventeenth Century. We in Anguilla debated our first law in the Legislative Assembly as recently as 1976. We do not have a critical press. There is no transparency in government. Everything government does is a state secret. Promises of regular consultation with the people have not been kept. We do not have viable political parties which offer us a choice when we want a change in government. The proof is to check for yourself when last we voted out an incumbent member of the House of Assembly. We have seven elected members of the House. One, Hubert Hughes, has been there since the dawn of constitutional rule in Anguilla in 1976. Others, Kenneth Harrigan, Osborne Fleming, Victor Banks, and Albelto Hughes, have been there since before the 1982 Constitution. The only new ones, Eddie Baird and McNeil Rogers, have come in at the resignation of the incumbents. We have proven ourselves too timid to change our representatives. It is almost a case of, “Better the devil you know than the one you don't know.” We need to see our institutions of democracy grow and mature before we can hope that our leaders will be honest and dependable. Until then, better the devil you know . . .

We also know how fragile our economy is. We have one industry, tourism. The livelihood of everyone in Anguilla depends in one way or another in its continued growth and success. The fear is what is going to happen to that industry when Cuba opens up to the American market? Will we be able to fill all the hotel rooms we are presently building? We need to work hard, perhaps for another 40 years, to diversify our economy to the state that we can withstand a shock on any one sector. Even Cayman Islands, so much richer than us, are refusing to look at a timetable for independence at this time.

The destiny of Anguilla has already been determined by our geography and our history. It lies in a future independent West Indian State. None of us wants an independent Anguilla sending representatives to the United Nations, London and Washington. We will turn into a failed-state disaster like Grenada, St Vincent, and Antigua. When Tobago and Barbuda and Nevis are free of their colonial bondage, when the people of our islands are ready to come together as one country, we want Anguilla to be a Province in that country, the Republic of the West Indies. There is safety in numbers. We would be quite mad to expose ourselves to unrestrained rule by our clueless leaders and their crooked cronies.

A third reason for not clamoring about our right to full internal self-government is that we can get almost all the full self-government improvements that we can handle. The British gave it to BVI and TCI without their waving it like a red flag in the face of a bull. The Constitutional and Electoral Reform Commission collected and published the recommendations for change and improvement agreed to by Anguillians. If implemented, they would have amounted to full internal self-government. The Commission did not use the slogan, given the warning that the British Government has given us.

It is a pointless exercise. We are not going to get it, without a time table for independence. We do not have any timetable for independence.

Is the Chief Minister being led down the garden path? Or, does he have a plan?

Open Mic

National Youth Ambassador Corps. On Friday, I had the privilege of addressing the young people of the Corps on the need for checks and balances in any future Anguilla Constitution. On Wednesday 28 May coming, the Corps has organised a panel discussion. It is designed to educate young people about the process of Constitutional reform. The event will be broadcast live on Kool FM. Questions can be emailed to the Kool FM Chat Room on the night of the event. It has been widely publicised on the island.

At the Friday meeting, we discussed the need to ensure that any future Constitution of Anguilla does not set in place a dictatorship of the Executive Council. Executive Council has the power to do permanent and irreversible damage to Anguilla and its society. At present, the only check on ExCo is the overriding power of the Governor and the Secretary of State. None of us has ever heard of either of them intervening to put a brake on the mismanagement of our leaders.

We can't blame the British. They have bigger fish to fry. The Governor is not put in Anguilla to guide and advise Ministers, far less to lead them. He has traditionally got one instruction from the Secretary of State before he sets out to take up his appointment, “Just make sure that we do not hear of any scandal in the press!” Once the Governor succeeds in keeping his assigned country quiet and peaceful, he is considered to have done a good job. If the locals allow their government to create havoc with their freedoms, that is their business. The Foreign Secretary is busy arranging to help the US bomb Iraq, while trying to restrain them from doing the same to Iran. How could we expect him to even be aware of Anguilla's existence, far less be concerned about the state of our government?

So, we are going to have to take the issue of good governance into our own hands. No one is going to look after our interests if we do not do it for ourselves. The new Constitution is our opportunity. We have to persuade the Legislature and the Executive and the British government to insert a full raft of checks and balances in our Constitution. Then, we shall be able to sail into future waters of increased self-government with confidence. If we do not, then it will be a case of the same old, same old. Only, with worse consequences.

Most of the different oversight bodies that I have previously written about come out of the Recommendations of the Constitutional and Electoral Reform Commission. Some have emerged from the subsequent discussions that have taken place under the aegis of the Chief Minister's Negotiating Team. So, what are some of these essential checks and balances? The list, with a link to any relevant earlier post, includes:

National Security Council

Boundaries Commission: 3 April 2008

Public Service Commission: 7 April 2008

Teaching Service Commission: 7 April 2008

Police Service Commission: 16 April 2008

Financial Service Commission: 20 April 2008

Judicial Service Commission: 24 April 2008

Anguillian Status Commission: 22 April 2008

Mercy Committee: 28 April 2008

Human Rights Commissioner: 27 April 2008

Complaints Commissioner/Ombudsman: 15 January 2008

Police Complaints Authority: 16 April 2008

Interests Commissioner: 19 February, 11 March, and 15 March

Crown land: 30 August 2007

Public Accounts Committee: 9 August 2007

Freedom of Information Act: 14 February 2007

Procurement: 26 February 2008

Integrity Pacts: 28 February 2008

This list is not exhaustive. The list is not necessarily the best. It may be too short for some. It may be too long for others. It may need compacting and collapsing. The functions are all important ones. It is not essential that there be a separate Commission or Commissioner to carry out each separate function. Given what a small island we are, one Complaints Commissioner may be able to handle the functions of the Ombudsman, the Police Complaints Authority, and the Human Rights Commissioner. It is not difficult for a legal draftsman to provide one body that will perform several quite different oversight functions.

Just let us not lose track of each of these functions.

I hope they come up on “Open Mic”.