‘It's time to make some demands of the UK!’ – Doug Wheatley
He made the comment on his Radio Talk Show ‘Speak Out BVI’ last evening September 23, 2014 on ZBVI 780 AM. During the show Wheatley was discussing the recent Referendum in Scotland and its result and after effects and drawing parallels with other Overseas Territories and Departments, including the French and the Dutch.
“There is a Referendum Act in the BVI. It is there for us to use. I have said before sometimes the question of self-determination is put forward to the political directorate and they say that the Territory is not ready. But as I said it has nothing to do with the politicians and the political directorate,” said Wheatley.
“Self-determination is for the people to decide what they want and if they want to have a Referendum on their future, then so be it. The people will decide. It is not the leaders who will decide,” said Wheatley.
“I think it is time we ought to step up to the plate and make some demands of the UK for what we want, whether it is greater autonomy or what have you,” he said.
“I mean… when you compare for example the BVI with the United States Virgin Islands…they are able to have first their own appointed Governor then their own elected Governor and a non-voting delegate to Congress,” he said.
“We don’t have any access to the British Parliament…we don’t vote for any Members of Parliament (MPs) in the British Parliament, we don’t lobby any MPs in the British Parliament for better deals and so for us…we have one conduit to the British Government and that is through the Foreign and Commonwealth Office…that we go through the Governor and on to the FCO. But we don’t get a chance as constituents to be able to meet and mingle with the parliamentarians and talk to them and tell them what we want,” he said.
“This might be an opportune moment when we might look into that kind of thing,” he said, referring to the attention the eyes of the world placed on Scotland and its push to have independence from the United Kingdom.
“Perhaps the time has come…since the UK is going through this transformation and they are only thinking of the four units of the UK, we ought to remind them that we are also a part of the UK and it is about time that we change up our relationship with them,” he said.
“It is not just a matter of fixing a little thing here and fixing a little thing there [in the Constitution]. I think the whole relationship has to be looked into,” said Wheatley.
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12 Responses to “‘It's time to make some demands of the UK!’ – Doug Wheatley”
The U.K. want to own these small islands so every now and then she should act like a Mother and take care of her children.
As I keep saying, if you think THIS is suffering, wait tip you see the real thing.
You don't notice people coming here from all over the Caribbean? Why? Because their islands are suffering and in comparison, ours are doing good.
You don't notice that we actually have a tourism industry? It may not be boom times like in the past, but we have tourist, so we have money moving through.
You don't notice that we even have billionaires living here and visiting here and even though they might not be throwing us billions, they are bringing their $$ into our economy.
So before all you go on complaining about how HARD times is here, step back 50 years, 75 years, 100 years etc to when life REALLY was HARD.
Seems to me UKGov is not very fond of owning us, but it offers a stability that currently benefits us.
And seems to me, some of us need to be examining our attitude and why we always complaining, instead of making the most of our situation.
I know things aint perfect, but be wary of complaining because when tings hard they real, real hard - and this generation of BVIslanders aint seen nothing yet.
The U.K. will have the last word if they wanted to, so don't fool yourself into believing we are in power to do as we please. Just watch, our islands have been slowly taken over right in front of our faces and we don't seem to see this. The BVI Islanders need to stop selling their land and hold on to it for dear life because at the rate I see things happening, we will be going around in the future saying "Oh, my family used to own that". Get it now? Unless we get our Independence, we will always be under the U.K. and that IS A FACT!