in
All
News / By: Fitsroy Randall on May 19, 2022 at 11:39 AM /
BVI Police Commissioner Mark Collins
As the United
States (US) continues to build its case against disgraced former Premier Andrew
Fahie and his alleged co-conspirators, Commissioner of Police in the BVI, Mark
Collins, has declined to state the extent of the Royal Virgin Islands Police
Force’s (RVIPF) involvement in the investigation process.
BVI News asked
Commissioner Mark Collins if US law enforcement agencies have been in contact
with the RVIPF for assistance into their probe of Fahie and his co-accused.
In response,
the Commissioner said: “That’s not something I would discuss with the media as
the Andrew Fahie investigation is still ongoing”.
Just last week,
Premier Dr Natalio Wheatley signalled the government’s willingness to cooperate
with the US officials if assistance is required in further investigations of
alleged co-conspirators of Fahie.
In Fahie’s
charging affidavit, there was mention of a person classified as ‘Government
Official 1” who was described as a high-ranking, corrupt government operative
who has ‘many employers’.
It was
insinuated the person is controlled by drug dealers and facilitates the passage
of illicit drugs through the territory.
Premier
Wheatley maintained the BVI has a strong history of working with officials in
the United States and will continue to do so.
Fahie was
arrested along with Managing Director of the BVI Ports Authority, Oleanvine
Maynard at Miami-Opa Locka Airport on April 28. Maynard’s son Kadeem was
arrested in St Thomas, USVI. The three are charged with conspiracy to import a
controlled substance (cocaine), conspiracy to engage in money laundering and
attempted money laundering.
Fahie and Oleanvine are currently being detained in Miami while Kadeem is in detention in Puerto Rico. The three face a possible life sentence if convicted of the alleged crimes.
in All News / By: BVI News on May 19, 2022 at 8:18 AM /
Premier Dr. Natalio Wheatley has expressed hopes for an urgent response from the United Kingdom (UK) to a proposal he submitted recently on the way forward for the BVI.
The BVI’s political leaders are hoping to avert direct rule by the UK as recommended in the Commission of Inquiry (COI) report which was released recently.
New Premier Wheatley with BVI Governor Rankin
Premier Wheatley disclosed previously that he had submitted a proposal to the UK on how the locally elected government can address concerns raised in the report and implement suggested reforms on its own.
“I’m hopeful that we would receive a decision within a few days. I’m hopeful. They received our proposal, they’ve said to us they’ve received it. They actually asked a few questions about the proposal, so we know that they are currently considering it and we are hopeful that they will come forward with a positive response to us very soon,” Dr. Wheatley said late last week.
Direct rule by the United Kingdom, as proposed by the COI report, may possibly entail a temporary partial suspension of the territory’s constitutional order and the assistance of an Advisory Council to support the Governor in the execution of his duties and the formulation of policy as the territory’s new leader.
Sir Gary Hickinbottom, who led the COI and authored the report, concluded that this suspension was necessary given that elected officials over the years have deliberately ignored the tenets of good governance.
He said this situation has given rise to an environment in which the risk of dishonesty in public decision-making and funding has continued unabated.
“We are hopeful that they accept [the terms in the proposal]. So I’m pretty sure that they will respond directly to our proposal as to whether they accept it or not accept it,” the Premier stated.
The President of Raise Your Voice Saint Lucia has expressed disgust at the continued sharing of graphic and at times embarrassing videos on social media.
Catherine Sealys is also concerned about the sharing of ‘intimate videos’ without the consent of the subject.
“Don’t share the video. It is wrong!” Sealys advises.
Sealys recalls that in the past several videos have appeared on social media, featuring among other things, mothers beating children and a man taking advantage of a naked woman who appeared to be intoxicated.
And most recently this week, the Raise Your Voice Saint Lucia President noted that a video had appeared on social media of a female accident victim in Vieux Fort.
Someone records the woman as she lies in pain on the ground with her skirt lifted.
“Your first duty is to save someone’s life, not to record them,” Sealys told St Lucia Times.
“For a woman to be in an accident and to be injured and to be on the ground suffering and somebody is videotaping her and then circulating that video, speaks to our tendency to absorb trauma, to be unempathetic,” she explained.
“Because if you are looking at this woman suffering, your first duty is to see how can you help her,” Sealys stated.
“I do not know what has happened to Saint Lucia, but everybody seems to feel anything that happens just take out my phone and start to video,” she lamented.
Sealys expressed concern over the national threshold for doing things that are unacceptable.
But she also condemned the hypocrisy of people who condemn the viral videos but share them anyway.
According to the Raise Your Voice Saint Lucia President, the relatives of victims continue to suffer.
“The persons in the video – they’re all over the place, not in the most dignified manner. We need to check ourselves in this country,” Sealys declared.
“This has to stop,” she asserted.
The Computer Misuse Act of Saint Lucia states:
Malicious communications
(15. — (1) A person shall not use a computer to send a message,
letter, electronic communication or article of any description that —
(a) is indecent or obscene;
(b) constitutes a threat; or
(c) is menacing in character,
with the intention to cause or being reckless as to whether he or she causes annoyance, inconvenience, distress or anxiety to the recipient or to any other person to whom he or she intends it or its contents to be communicated.
(2) A person who contravenes subsection (1) commits an offence and is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months or both and in the case of a subsequent conviction, to a fine not exceeding twenty thousand dollars or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or both.
According to the law, “computer” means a device that accepts information, in the form of digitalized data, and manipulates the information for some result based on a program or sequence of instructions on how the data is to be processed.
Shots for scratch! Medicine for moolah! Covid immunity for prizes and money! Chelsea Stahl / MSNBC
– May 14, 2021, By Hayes Brown, MSNBC Opinion Columnist
The best reason to get Covid-19 vaccine shots is, of course, to not have yourself, your loved ones, or your neighbors get infected and potentially die from a virus that has killed almost 600,000 people in the U.S. But $1 million is a pretty good runner-up, I have to say.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine on Wednesday announced the “Vax-a-Million” program. Starting May 26, a random Ohioan will be drawn weekly from the Ohio secretary of state’s voter registration database to get $1 million — so long as they’re vaccinated. Another five 12- to 17 year-olds will get the chance to sign up for a possible full-ride scholarship to a state college or university, again provided they’re vaccinated.
As a former resident of Michigan, I’m loath to say anything positive about the state’s southern neighbor. But this is actually a pretty genius idea from the Ohio government, especially given that “the Ohio Lottery will conduct the drawings but the money will come from existing federal coronavirus relief funds,” as The Columbus Dispatch reported.
Absent a decent stick — aside from, you know, the risk of dying from a virus — we’ve been forced to find carrots to convince the masses.
But we’ve been hoping that more education will bring down hesitancy for months now. And while that may be the case among some demographics, others still stubbornly refuse to get vaccinated — looking at you, white Republican men. The Biden administration has so far ruled out any sort of penalty for people who aren’t vaccinated; the Food and Drug Administration still hasn’t approved any of the vaccines yet — it has only authorized them for emergency use, which isn’t the same.
Absent a decent stick — aside from, you know, the risk of dying from a virus — we’ve been forced to find carrots to convince the masses. That has included encouraging selfies to handing out stickers to what we’re seeing in Ohio now. So it may seem desperate at this point, but I can’t be mad at any and all efforts to get people vaccinated.
It might not even take the full million bucks to sway people. Polling backs up the idea that offering smaller amounts of cold, hard cash could make a difference. UCLA’s Covid-19 Health and Politics Project asked over 7,000 people who had yet to be vaccinated whether they’d be more likely to do so if they were paid for it. Thirty-four percent of respondents said $100 would make them more likely to make appointments; 31 percent said 50 bucks would do the trick.
So while Ohio has the highest potential payout, other states have been reaching out to people through their wallets. After a wildly successful rollout, West Virginia’s lagging numbers prompted Gov. Jim Justice to propose giving $100 savings bonds to residents ages 16 to 35 who get vaccinated. (They’re still working on how to deliver those bonds to the newly vaccinated.) As in Ohio, that money would come from federal Covid-19 funds already sent to the state.
It’s not just money on offer. In Chicago, the city will have a series of free concerts that will be open only to people who can prove they’re fully vaccinated. A hospital group in Alaska is giving away prizes, including airline tickets and money toward the purchase of an ATV. Here in New York City, Shake Shack is offering free fries when you buy a sandwich and flash your vaccination card. Krispy Kreme’s decision to offer free donuts to the vaccinated set off a whole round of discourse about whether the company was encouraging obesity. (It wasn’t, and the fatphobia was rightly shouted down.)
My favorite bribery scheme so far? Beer. In New Jersey, participating breweries will provide a free beer if you show your proof of vaccination as part of the state government’s “Shot and a Beer” program. (Get it? It’s a pun.) It’s a better name than Erie County, New York’s “Shot and a Chaser” program — but the latter is the best anecdotal evidence we have so far that these programs can get results, especially if you offer the shots at the brewery, too.
Are there arguments against bribing the masses to go get their shots? Sure. Back in January, when the vaccines were first being rolled out, an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association argued that proposals to pay people up to $1,500 for getting vaccinated were a waste of funds and morally questionable and that they might even backfire.
In a climate characterized by widespread distrust of government and a propensity to endorse conspiracy theories, those who are already COVID-19 vaccine-hesitant might perceive that the government would not be willing to pay people to get vaccinated if the available vaccines were truly safe and effective. Incentive payments might also stoke new fears and, perversely, increase resistance to vaccination.
It’s a well-reasoned set of concerns. But the article ends by noting that a “policy of paying people for Covid-19 vaccination should be adopted only as a last resort if voluntary vaccine uptake proves insufficient to promote herd immunity within a reasonable period of time.”
That sounds a lot like, well, now. That means that if you’re reading this in Ohio, good luck getting a windfall for doing the right thing. I’m rooting for you. It may be the only time I root for someone from Ohio, so savor this moment.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Haitian authorities announced Friday that more than 400 inmates escaped and 25 people died in a prison breakout, making it the country’s largest and deadliest one in a decade, with the prison director and a powerful gang leader among those killed.
Some believe Thursday’s jailbreak at the Croix-des-Bouquets Civil Prison in northeast Port-au-Prince was to free gang leader Arnel Joseph, who had been Haiti’s most wanted fugitive until his 2019 arrest on charges including rape, kidnapping, and murder.
Joseph was riding on a motorcycle through the Artibonite area in the town of L’Estère on Friday a day after his escape when he was spotted at a checkpoint, police spokesman Gary Desrosiers told The Associated Press. He said Joseph pulled out a gun and died in an exchange of gunfire with police.
Joseph ruled Village de Dieu, or Village of God, a shantytown in downtown Port-au-Prince, and other communities, including some in Artibonite, which is Haiti’s largest department.
Authorities have not yet provided many details on the breakout except to say that 60 inmates have been recaptured and the investigation is ongoing. State Secretary Frantz Exantus said authorities have created several commissions to investigate who organized the breakout and why. Among those killed was the prison director, identified as Paul Joseph Hector.
Residents who declined to be identified because they feared for their life told the AP that they saw gunmen shoot at prison guards on Thursday before inmates escaped from the Croix-des-Bouquets penitentiary.
The prison is known for a 2014 breakout in which more than 300 of the 899 inmates being held there at the time escaped. Some believed that attack was designed to free Clifford Brandt, the son of a prominent businessman, who had been imprisoned since 2012 for allegedly kidnapping the adult children of a rival businessman. Brandt was captured two days later near the Dominican Republic border.
After the 2014 breakout, officials said they were taking steps to up security at the prison that Canada built-in 2012, including installing security cameras and placing ankle monitors on the most dangerous prisoners. It wasn’t immediately clear if any of those measures were taken. At the time of Thursday’s breakout, the prison held 1,542 inmates, nearly twice its capacity.
Haiti’s largest prison breakout in recent history occurred after the devastating 2010 earthquake in which more than 4,200 inmates fled the notorious National Penitentiary in downtown Port-au-Prince.
The former President’s tweets and reports of his calls to Republican congressmen during the riot became a key part of the case against him. Photograph by Brendan Smialowski / Getty
On Friday afternoon, when senators got their chance to ask questions in Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial, one of the first came from Lisa Murkowski, Republican of Alaska, and Susan Collins, Republican of Maine. Like all of the senators’ questions, this one had been written on a yellow notecard, passed from the gallery to Patrick Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, who was presiding and then read aloud by a clerk. “Exactly when did President Trump learn of the breach of the Capitol, and what specific actions did he take to bring the rioting to an end? And when did he take them?” Murkowski and Collins wanted to know. “Please be as detailed as possible.” The two senators are among the handful of Republicans who are seen as possible votes to convict the former President for inciting an insurrection, and, for that reason alone, their question, which was directed at Trump’s lawyers, was worth taking seriously. But it also got at a central inquiry in the trial: How many people were Trump willing to see get hurt in his effort to hold on to the Presidency?
Michael van der Veen, one of Trump’s lawyers, didn’t really answer. “The House managers have given us absolutely no evidence one way or the other on to that question,” van der Veen, whose professional specialty is personal injury cases, said. This was an odd complaint, given that the question concerned his client’s knowledge and actions. Flipping through some papers, van der Veen offered that there had been “a tweet at 2:38 P.M.” on January 6th—which would have been almost half an hour after a mob seeking to disrupt the Electoral College vote tally had breached the Capitol—and so “it was certainly some time before then” that Trump had learned of the riot. (In the tweet, Trump advised the mob to be peaceful, but failed to tell them to leave the Capitol—perhaps because that was where he wanted them to be.) Van der Veen added, “That’s the problem with this entire proceeding. The House managers did zero investigation! The American people deserve a lot better than coming in here with no evidence. Hearsay on top of hearsay on top of reports that are of hearsay.” Van der Veen muttered something about due process and then, without any further attempt to answer the question, he sat down.
In one respect, his reply is an example of the dismissive, blame-shifting, reality-defying manner in which Trump’s defense has been conducted. Trump’s lawyers may have also recognized that the question of his response on January 6th has become a particularly hazardous area for him—and, indeed, for a few hours on Saturday morning, it seemed to have changed the timeline for the trial, opening the door for witnesses. The question is powerful for more than one reason. First, his reaction spoke of his intent: if he had truly been misunderstood by his supporters, who certainly seemed to believe that they were fulfilling his wishes, he might have quickly expressed shock and condemnation, told them in no uncertain terms to leave the Capitol, and rushed to send reinforcements. He, of course, did none of these things. Despite van der Veen’s claims, and even though much about how, exactly, Trump spent his time is not known, the House managers did document the former President’s inaction. It wasn’t until after 4 P.M. that he told the rioters to go home, but, in the same message, he said, “We love you,” and took the time to complain, again, about the election. As Stacey Plaskett, a House manager and a delegate representing the Virgin Islands, noted, when she got a chance to respond to the Murkowski-Collins query, the reason that the question of what Trump did to help “keeps coming up is because the answer is ‘nothing.’ ”
As Plaskett took her seat, Collins and Senator Mitt Romney, Republican of Utah, sent a question to the chair about the second aspect of Trump’s response: his attitude regarding the danger to Vice-President Mike Pence. In the days leading up to the January 6th assault, Trump had pounded home the message that he expected Pence, who was set to preside over the joint session of Congress that day, to sabotage and disrupt the electoral-vote certification. Under the Constitution, Pence did not have the power to do that, as he and many others explained to Trump. No matter: Trump drew his supporters into his effort to pressure Pence to act lawlessly. At the rally before the assault, Trump built up the expectation that Pence might still come through. “All Vice-President Pence has to do is send it back to the states to recertify, and we become President, and you are the happiest people,” he said, and added, “Mike Pence is going to have to come through for us.” When people in the mob realized that Pence had not done so, they shouted that he was a traitor and chanted, “Hang Mike Pence!” They began searching for him inside the Capitol; at about 2:13 P.M., Secret Service agents took him out of the Senate chamber, to a room where he took shelter with his family, before being moved again.
As Pence hid, the mob heard from Trump. The 2:38 P.M. tweet was not his first since the breach of the Capitol. At 2:24 P.M., Trump posted this: “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution . . . the USA demands the truth!” Romney and Collins asked whether, when Trump sent that “disparaging tweet,” he was “aware that the Vice-President had been removed from the Senate by the Secret Service for his safety.” Joaquin Castro, one of the House managers, replied that the assault itself was being reported live. People, he said, “couldn’t consume any media or probably take any phone calls or anything else without hearing about this, and also hearing about the Vice-President.” Castro also noted that Senator Tommy Tuberville, Republican of Alabama, had confirmed that he had been on a phone call with Trump, which ended when he told him, “Mr. President, they just took the Vice-President out. I’ve got to go.”
It would be good to know more about that call to Tuberville—on Saturday, Mike Lee, whose phone Tuberville had used, said his call log indicated that the call had begun at 2:26 P.M., right after the tweet—but the focus soon shifted to another one, between Trump and Kevin McCarthy, the House Minority Leader. On Friday evening, after the trial had adjourned for the day, CNN reported new details of the “expletive-laced” call between Trump and McCarthy, citing several Republicans who had heard the Minority Leader’s account of it. Trump did not seem interested in ending the violence. According to some who spoke with McCarthy, Trump told him, “Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are,” suggesting that McCarthy could learn from their devotion. (Three weeks later, McCarthy made a pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago, to reconcile with Trump.) Representative Jaime Herrera Beutler, of Washington—one of only ten House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump—had spoken publicly in January about McCarthy’s account of the call. On Friday, she put out a statement in which she told any “patriots” who had heard Trump’s side of his conversations that day that “if you have something to add here, now would be the time.” In other words, witnesses are welcome. When the trial convened on Saturday morning, Jamie Raskin, the lead House manager, said that he wanted to subpoena Herrera Beutler, offering to depose her via Zoom. Van der Veen responded with an angry tirade, in which he said that any witnesses—he mentioned Vice-President Kamala Harris—would have to come to his Philadelphia office. (That is a fantasy.) The Senate voted 55–45 to allow witnesses—and then, after closed-door negotiations, the lawyers and House managers agreed to enter Herrera Beutler’s statement into the record instead.
Herrera Beutler had also suggested that Mike Pence might have something to say. For example, he might add something to van der Veen’s reply to Romney and Collins’s question. “The answer is no,” van der Veen said. “At no point was the President informed the Vice-President was in any danger.” This is an absurd answer. Even putting aside the particularities of Pence’s situation—that it was the Secret Service, for example, that led him out of the chamber—Trump certainly knew that his Vice-President was in a dangerous setting. If, before sending the tweet, he had bothered to find out whether Pence was safe, he would certainly have been given an even more troubling report. Pence was not safe: the managers’ presentation made clear that the mob had come even closer to him and his family than had previously been understood. At that moment, Trump not only abandoned Pence—he targeted him. To put it another way, the incitement did not end when the first window was broken.
Van der Veen, however, argued that the Pence question wasn’t even “really relevant to the charges for the impeachment in this case.” The House managers had focussed on how Trump’s actions ahead of January 6th had laid the groundwork for the violence; these included his threats to election officials and his summoning of his supporters for a “wild” rally to coincide with the vote certification. Trump’s lawyers seemed to believe that he had to answer only for his precise words at the rally, for which they offered improbable explanations. (Because Trump, early in his speech, had observed that the crowd planned to “peacefully and patriotically” protest, the lawyers brushed aside his subsequent repeated calls for them to act quite differently.) In their telling, it was as if Trump were just someone who had happened to wander onto the stage, with no context, history, or—perhaps most of all—power. But when the President of the United States tells people that they must go to the building he’s pointing at, the Capitol, and fight, or else “you’re not going to have a country anymore”—and when he says that “when you catch somebody in a fraud, you are allowed to go by very different rules”—he is doing something distinct. Trump’s lawyers, throughout their defense, ignored all the ways that Trump used and abused the office of the Presidency to make January 6th unfold as it did. As Raskin had noted, the impeachment process, with its reference to “high crimes and misdemeanors,” has a political character that makes it distinct from the ordinary criminal justice process.
In the course of the defense presentation—which lasted a little more than three hours, less than a quarter of the time that Trump’s lawyers were allotted—they played so many clips of Representative Maxine Waters, Democrat of California, delivering fiery speeches, that one might have thought that she was on trial. There were also videos of other Democratic politicians, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Karen Bass, Al Green, Ayanna Pressley, Ilhan Omar, and Hillary Clinton—and even ones featuring Madonna, Chris Cuomo, and Johnny Depp. One video, played multiple times, consisted of clips of Democratic senators and House managers using the word “fight” in different contexts. (Judging from the placard set up next to him in one clip, Representative Joe Neguse, one of the impeachment managers, was captured saying, during his first term in Congress, that he’d fight for the Colorado Outdoor Recreation and Economy Act, which, among other things, helps preserve areas for mountain biking and protects the habitat of the greater sage grouse.) Speaking of the people shown in the videos, Plaskett noted, “It is not lost on me that so many of them were people of color. And women—Black women.” As Trump surely knows, that message won’t be lost on his supporters, either.
The underlying message in Trump’s defense, however, was that it was outrageous that his actions were being questioned at all. Bruce Castor, another of his lawyers, told the senators that, by any measure, Trump was “the most pro-police, anti-mob-rule President this country has ever seen.” The senators had already heard from the managers how, for months before the assault, Trump had reveled in acts of political violence, such as when COVID-lockdown protesters attacked state buildings in Lansing, Michigan, or when vehicles driven by his supporters dangerously surrounded a bus of Biden campaign workers on a Texas highway. The senators had also seen evidence of the injuries that his supporters had inflicted on officers with the Capitol Police and Metropolitan D.C. Police. But Castor showed them one of the videos. There was Trump, standing in front of an American flag, saying, “I am your President of law and order.” The scenes changed—to people holding Black Lives Matter signs, to street violence, to Maxine Waters, again—but always returned to Trump with the words “LAW AND ORDER” superimposed on the screen. “We know that the President would never have wanted such a riot to occur, because his long-standing hatred for violent protesters and his love for law and order is on display, worn on his sleeve every single day that he served in the White House,” Castor said. He sounded like he was offering a declaration of faith—against all the evidence of reality—not a legal argument. On Saturday morning, Mitch McConnell, the Senate Minority Leader, reportedly told colleagues that he planned to vote to acquit. The Trumpist credo, it seems, is one that the Republican Party intends to live by.
has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 2014. She has been at the magazine since 1995, and, as a senior editor for many years, focusing on national security, international reporting, and features.
A law enforcement official said the evacuation was prompted by what turned out to be a fire at a homeless encampment.
National Guard members take a staircase toward the U.S. Capitol building on Jan. 18, 2021. Patrick Semansky / AP
By Rebecca Shabad
WASHINGTON — A “small fire” under a nearby bridge prompted the temporary shutdown of the U.S. Capitol complex and the evacuation of the west front of the building, where a rehearsal for Wednesday’s inaugural ceremony was underway Monday.
“Public safety and law enforcement responded to a small fire in the area of 1st and F streets SE, Washington, D.C. that has been extinguished,” the Secret Service tweeted. “Out of an abundance of caution the U.S. Capitol complex was temporarily shutdown. There is no threat to the public.”
President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris were not at the Capitol when the incident occurred. Both are participating in Monday in-service events to mark Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Biden and his wife are helping to distribute goods at Philabundance, Philadelphia’s largest hunger-relief organization, while Harris and her husband are volunteering in D.C.
Yogananda Pittman, acting chief of Capitol Police, acted out of “an abundance of caution following an external security threat under the bridge on I-295 at First and F Streets,” and ordered a shutdown of the Capitol complex, according to a statement from Capitol Police.
Details of the incident came after an announcement was made across the Capitol that said that there was an external security threat and that people should stay where they are, and to stay away from doors and windows.
A notice sent to House and Senate offices said, “All buildings within the Capitol Complex: Due to an external security threat located under the bridge on I-295 at First and F Streets SE, no entry or exit is permitted at this time. You may move throughout the buildings but stay away from exterior windows and doors. If you are outside, seek cover.”
Washington is on a high state of alert as Biden’s swearing-in approaches after the Jan. 6 events that led to the violent storming of the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob.
Rebecca Shabad
Rebecca Shabad is a congressional reporter for NBC News, based in Washington.
As of today, Montserrat would be congratulated for being COVID-19 ‘infected free’ having gone from a nonchalance and carefree approach. Many would say that the unnecessary they willfully or otherwise created a police state. It was and still is the result of the disgraceful and uncaring extreme, leading the charge of criminalising the safeguards, guidelines, and restrictions they copied and found necessary. It’s not tasting well to those who must suffer the unbelievable indifference.
We wrote many drafts written since April, all lamenting the poor extremes of a less than six-month-old Government that promised it would be different working only in the interest of the people of Montserrat (whoever those represent) have been able to deliver or not deliver. This due of course to what is considered a very poor beginning, continuing in the way they handled a pandemic that had been pointed out was likely due to happen.
Well placed professionals and concerned persons aided by TMR
publicity had documented to Governor Pierce and Premier Farrell, suggesting and
asking: “whether
St Patrick’s Week should be celebrated this year in the teeth of a deadly virus
that may be on the verge of becoming a global pandemic.Should our
visitors introduce the virus to Montserrat both of you will have to face some
very hard questions over any deaths that may ensue.”
That was not even met with an
acknowledgement far less a response. In April we reported already that the
Government may have missed the boat, having ignored completely the warnings and
suggestions to cancel or postpone the large gatherings and visitors from areas
where COVID-19 was already a great concern and people being infected.
Instead, we were to learn of comments and worse than Trump-like suggestions, “Oh this is just going to be like a (normal) flu…nothing to worry about…”, coming from top government officials including those who would have enormous powers and responsibilities in these matters.
Premier Easton Farrell with Dr. Dorothea Hazel-Blake during a virtual press conference responding a Nerissa Golden (inset) at bottom
Meantime, on March 5, 2020, we were told that “On Monday, March 2, the National Influenza Pandemic and Preparedness Committee
(NIPPPC) met to review the
government’s action plan and risk mitigation for COVID-19, and to recap the
evolving global and regional situation.”
Now could be that, that the Premier and his team at a press conference took issue with me when told that there was a lack of seriousness early as February about the seriousness of this potential pandemic. The Premier with verbal support and head-nodding said: “Montserrat did take it seriously. No one can accuse this administration of not acting aggressively….We were on top of this right from the beginning.”
Premier Farrell-made weekly statements and held virtual press conferences. two at the end of March, April, May; he was accompanied by his ministerss members and other health officials. The Governor seen (left) on two occasions, but Minister Kirnon (left) below ceased to attend, wants to have nothing to do with the media. Mrs. Hazel Blake now takes questions dealing directly with COVID. There will be more on the press conferences
The question must be, “when
was that beginning? Indeed at that meeting, we were told in a release, “The islands Chief Medical Officer (CMO) and Quarantine
Authority, Dr. Sharra Greenway-Duberry, and other senior Health Officials
presented updated information on the spread of the COVID 19 and the Ministry of
Health’s plans related to screening, isolation and quarantine.”
Great! But the timing and the urgent seriousness was lacking for reasons noted; because at that time as I learned later from participating in regional PAHO/WHO/CARPHA press briefings, Montserrat was part of their excellent and tremendous support.
I attended a regional MEDIA briefing by PAHO/WHO/CARPHA, I asked the question, how come with all the support they had just boasted to the region, that Montserrat ended up with the highest per capita number of cases as early as April, embarrassing the region and its mother country, with a threat of being taken over. The response was though true and not surprising, heard by the entire region, exposed a situation that has plagued us, certainly more so, the past 10 years.
What ensued after mid-March into May/June, the height of ignorance, and foolish and dishonest utterances; the poor way Montserrat has handled its finances, exposing the obvious lack of proper financial planning, exposing the worst kind of governance, management and lack of knowledge of really what is Montserrat, with ultimately the need now to cover it all up is setting us so far back, must be discussed. In time, or else.
A report following that briefing included this: “Leveraging PAHO’s long-standing working relationship with the Barbados Defense Force (BDF) and the Regional Security System (RSS), especially in response to public health emergencies, Barbados worked with both the BDF and RSS to facilitate the distribution of critical COVID-19 related supplies and equipment, procured by PAHO, and destined to its 10 countries and territories in the Caribbean: Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, St Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia and St Vincent and the Grenadines.”
It can be seen right away one
reason we might not have benefited as we ought to. No wonder there is no longer
the ferry and why Premier Farrell is adamant that Prime Minister Gaston Browne
should be the one to take the initiative to improve our transportation to
Montserrat from the outside world? What a way to love Montserrat.
On 17 January, 2020 the Pan American Sanitary Bureau activated an organization-wide response to provide all 51 of its Member States and territories with technical cooperation to address and mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. PAHO’s work to date falls under the following four key objectives from its regional response strategy delivering resources in different forms:
Ensure real-time
information to countries and efficient coordination of national and regional
response operations;
Limit
human-to-human transmission, including reducing secondary infections among
close contacts and healthcare workers, and preventing transmission
amplification events;
Identify, isolate, and
care for patients early, including providing optimized care for infected
patients;
Communicate critical risk
and event information to all communities, and counter misinformation.
We would learn that as far back as January 2020, PAHO/WHO/CARPHA had been already holding training sessions, logistics, communicating and distributing equipment, PPE and equipment (testing machines and masks) educational materials, posters, and pamphlets throughout the region. What did Montserrat to this day have to show they participated in anything from these organisations, except maybe some posters and pamphlets? They waited for the UK to deliver, then waited for training; and was it in May, June or even later when this equipment arrived, delivered to other OTs months earlier?
We had seen reports of some islands, such as Dominica included, had received testing machines since mid-late March, while Montserrat was busy importing the virus, misleading people about the non-existent screening they had touted in the March 5 release. I looked for it when at the seaport, asking questions discreetly, but only saw it quietly being done in Antigua. In fact, questions were being asked when it was not seen at the airport with the belief it was being done at the seaport.
Other OTs had already received the UK funding planned months ago while Montserrat was still thinking about asking at the end of March. In October members of the Legislative Assembly as well as the rest of Montserrat are still waiting for a clear explanation about the unprecedented deficit budget and how some people/businesses received in April were not able to benefit from the UK $8.5 million ring-fenced for COVID-19 related support.
What exactly was contained in the
request that should have been sent since the end of March, but did not leave
Montserrat until well after the £2.5 million was received?
The question about the difficulties
the people (mostly disenfranchised through one means or the other and for
reasons not unknown but will be dealt with at different times.
The moneys! That they should refuse some people/businesses who applied for the relief, they anticipated and supplied by the UKG, under some concocted ‘criteria’! Many seek answers as to some accounting to the people, but many listened to the deplorable time and again in the Legislative Assembly. Where is that accounting? Then there are the sufferings during the lockdown, arrests, and more.
So sad!! This may not have been the worst, but the wilfulness, the torture, the obvious suffering makes it so…and if all that is being brought to light is true the cop and others should be charged with the first degree … Just sad about the few and the extreme reactions, but what did the DTp do, just incite with what his cronies called, ‘eloquence’. How sad! The following was shared : He called out to his Mom …. who died 2 years ago on the same day ????? RIP Handcuffed. Fac…See More
Face Down. Knee on his neck. They did nothing.
He called the officer “Sir.” They did nothing.
He begged for his life. He begged for water. He begged for mercy. They did nothing.
His nose bled. His body trembled. He lost control of his bladder. They did nothing.
He cried out, “I can’t breathe.” They did nothing.
One last time, he gasped, “I can’t breathe.” They did nothing.
He lost consciousness. They did nothing.
A firefighter demanded they check his pulse. They did nothing.
Off duty medical personnel begged them to stop. They did nothing.
Deprived of oxygen. His organs screaming. His brain frantic. They did nothing.
They watched George Floyd die. His life fading. A slow death. They did nothing.
A lynching on the ground. They did nothing.
For eight agonizing minutes. Four officers watched.
He cried out for his Mom… A grown man… Crying out for the woman who gave him life… As he feared joining her in death. And still, they did nothing.
A black man. A gentle giant. Murdered because he was black. And still, they’ve done nothing..
The officers should be arrested. And still, they’ve done nothing.
REST IN PEACE ??????
May justice be served.
BLACK IS HUMAN TOO, NO HUMAN BEING IS MORE HUMAN THAN ANOTHER HUMAN
Leadership, when it is that poor is really as this guy calls it, will have bad consequences, worse than with those pretend at it! The legendary San Antonio Spurs coach is past done with Donald Trump’s inability to rise to this moment.thenation.comGregg Popovich: ‘The System Has to Change’ The legendary San Antonio Spurs coach is past done with Donald…The legendary San Antonio Spurs coach is past done with Donald Trump’s inability to rise to this moment.
