The calendar listed it as a holiday to mark the birthday of BVIs first Chief Minister, Hamilton Lavity Stoutt, so we celebrated on Monday.
We went as far as to reenact the first sitting of the 13th Legislative Council under him as Chief Minister (now Premier). But we wonder if the sitting Legislators understand what made Stoutt a legend in our eyes?
It was not because he was a saint or did everything correctly. After all, his name is tied up with the Bates Hill fiasco that was the reclamation of Wickhams Cay.
But Lavity had some endearing qualities that suited the people. He was CONCILIATORY. He always felt that one enemy was one too many and he worked tirelessly to draw people closer.
He was TENACIOUS. We remember when he wanted his college and the lengths he went to in order to make that possible.
Fine mahogany trees were cleared in the agricultural basin to make way for royal palms. The people were incensed. His hatchet in those days was one of the most productive Chief Engineers the PWD had ever seen; Berges.
Lavity was RESOLUTE. When he decided on the dual carriage way, he was termed a raving country lunatic who could not have known better.
But he did.
He was STRATEGIC and DETERMINED. Lavity understood the need to properly fund PWD including with the right number of engineers and architects, QS and draughts men. PWD was a hive of activity overseen from his Ministry of works.
And he always worried about putting most of his surplus into building and maintaining the infrastructure. For he knew that without a good infrastructure, BVI would remain, disgracefully, third world.
And without his reinvestment and building programme, the economy would stagnate.
Nowadays we treat the Ministry of Works in the manner that the Egyptians of Moses’ day treated the Israelites.
They were expected to make bricks daily but had to find the straw for the bricks themselves. Of course, they were penalized when they could not deliver.
We want an infrastructure that our government refuses to fund. If only they thought that the Territory’s infrastructure was as important as their travel responsibilities…
…. And we accuse the subject Minister of dereliction of duty and grill him mercilessly in the Honourable House when the House Members know that they voted him no money to execute his mandate.
Perhaps the Minister is a magician after all; Maybe even a Rumpelstiltskin.
As expected, the people marched on Berges. The placards said that “Berges has to go,” and a vibrant group of protesters made their way to the Central Administration Building (CAB) to deliver the message.
Lavity had VISION. The CAB was carefully planned and built under his guidance but nowadays it is named for another who had no hand in it.
And its offices have been empty since 2017 because the government refused to allow the Recovery and Development Agency (RDA) to rebuild it and they struggle.
Stoutt was a TEAM LEADER. Lavity was in a meeting of a caucus of his ministers and knew of the planned protest but ignorant of its level of support.
He told his works minister, T. B. Lettsome, that “Berges is not going anywhere. He is doing our work.”
But when the large gathering got to the East wing of the CAB at the same moment that his Caucus was leaving, he conceded that Berges would indeed be gone.
Lavity respected the voice of the people. And while he, as leader, was a mouthpiece, the voice, when marshaled, had its own power.
And it is that voice that BVI is struggling to find. For now, it is uncoordinated, disparate. Sometimes loud and devoid of substance. Other times, unfair, unfocused, untruthful.
But there are moments when it harmonizes and hits its mark.
The important thing is that the voice, in time, will occupy its rightful place and we the willing will be better able to guide the unknowing as they seek to do the almost impossible;
Find the line of best fit. That is to say, the greatest good for the greatest number…
…The essence of democracy!
When else is candor tolerated in BVI but on Fridays?
Happy Friday!