Governor has all the power in proposal by coalition gov't
Nothing in the proposal has been discussed with the public; however, Premier Wheatley recently promised public meetings starting on June 20, 2022.
In keeping with the Wheatley Administration’s policy of appeasement to the UK, on the table will be a mandatory pre-review by the Governor of any contract worth $250,000 or more, which the Government wishes to enter into before a contractual commitment is made. With this new proposal, it is unclear the role of the public tender process and the Financial Management Act, which governs public sector contracts.
In keeping with direct rule without suspending the constitution, the coalition government is to submit monthly activity reports by each Ministry and their departments to the Governor's Office for review, according to the draft proposal not yet discussed with the public.
Governor in charge?
Further, without even amending the different legislation for statutory bodies, it is proposed that there is submission of quarterly updates by all statutory boards to the Premier and Governor for review.
The all-powerful governor, following the Commission of Inquiry’s report, will enjoy mandatory consultation between the Governor and respective Ministers on Statutory Board appointments before approval by Cabinet.
What should be of great concern to residents is under the draft proposal the Governor will be empowered to dissolve Statutory Boards for violation of governance standards. It is unclear who develops the standards.
In another shocking move that is part of the Unity Government's proposal, the now all-powerful governor gets to select a proportion of Statutory Board appointments.
No business persons are allowed in the HoA?
It appears that elected representatives of the House of Assembly (HoA) will be under the management of the Governor with little or no separation of the three branches of Government. It is proposed in the draft document, according to the same senior sources from the coalition government, that the HoA amend legislation to require each member of the HoA to declare his or her interest on time.
Initial failure of an HoA member to declare his or her interest by the deadline would trigger automatic suspension for two sittings of the HoA and carry a fine of $5000.00. These penalties would continue to roll over until his or her declaration is submitted to the Registrar of Interest.
Failure of an HoA member to declare his or her interests to the Registrar of Interests a month after the deadline would require him or her to vacate his or her seat, according to the draft proposal being discussed with the governor.
Residents who wish to become HoA Members who are businessmen or women should not run for office. Proposal in the draft is to amend existing legislation to not permit/any elected Member to apply for, or be approved for, a future Government contract, including Statutory Boards, after May 2023, according to many other proposals to empower the Governor to run the country.
It is important to note that this kind of measure does not exist in the United Kingdom Parliament.
All ports security will belong to the Governor
Another shocking proposal is to transfer responsibility for security of all ports (airports and seaports) to the Governor. Currently, governors are in charge of the police force and even that they cannot carry out in a satisfactory way, with crime on the rise.
Nevertheless, the current government is willing to surrender all security to the Governor, in keeping with their policy of appeasement.
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64 Responses to “Governor has all the power in proposal by coalition gov't”
The last two governments have lost it.
The rules are simple.
Weed out the greed and the Bvi will be handed back.
We will never go back
He has surrendered even before the battle commenced! What about a proud history of doing for self? How can strangers govern our people? Young leader has a defeated demeanor with no knowledge of democracy, his approach is imperial akin to slavery again!
Where is the PARTNERSHIP? Gosh, Man.
Give the Governor the responsibility and sit back and see what happen.
I wonder if they will try to break up contracts into $250k chunks. Will they turn their businesses over to someone else? Willl they try to get front men to apply for government contracts on their behalf? They think they are so smart, it will be fun watching them getting chewed out in public.
I look forward to seeing HOA members fined or forced to vacate for fudging their interests, that would be nice.
This us very sad and regretible. The cost of self pride, greed, and unrighteousness is very high. I do hope that we will greatly learn the high principles of good governance in the shortest of time possible.
I hope that in approximately 2 years or there about that there will be no need for direct Government, but that we Will be made ready for fair adjustment made to the reality that good governance means righteous management of our finances for the good all our people best interest, not the greedy few.
Lastly,I still have confidence in this patchup so-called Unity Government under the former VIP Cabinet. They did not informed us of any their former leader twistedness. They should have had, in my opinion became knowledgeable of at least some of slickinsss, but stayed mum to us the people their boss, and pretended all were well, and their actions was for our best interest. However, we the people are partially deserving of blame. We elected not them us.
(Like or dislike)
But we need constitutional reform. It must never be the case again that the Premier has such unchecked power. We need a bigger and more broadly based HOA so that the ruling cliques do not completely control it. That might mean fewer sittings and even part time members. We need a real democracy, one where adults who have lived in BVI all their lives have a say in the running of the country and are not some kind of second class citizen whose lives are run at the whim of a minority.
Ain't nothing right anout this sh**
We go independent and paddle our own canoe.
Stop fr***ing us up, man. Ungrateful, two-toone people. Sick ah um.
However, as much as I disageed with the current Premier on many things that he did tolerated, and others that he had agreed with, I do agree with him that continuing locking horns with the UK in the political war that his former Premie, Andreiw A. Fahie lead was a bad idea. In other words, in a battle the will, the strongest of two powers wins over the weaker one.every time.
In conclusion, mismanagement of our finances, especially by, our political leaders, and others that supported them is the main reason for our downfall, not the UK, not the CoI, not the former governor not the present one, but our own selfish decisions made, and done against our own representatives.
However, some of our finances were misspent with good intention, and some was deliberately stolen, in mine and many others honest opinion, knowledge too.
However, all humans do make mistake, many.
-Rampant drugs trade
-Corruption throughout Gov
-Boats still litter the shorelines
-Garbage piled high across the islands
-Raw sewage runs in streets and into the ocean
-Broken education system
-Broken schools
-Unsafe roads
-No environmental protections (mangroves, wetlands, beaches, vegetation) all being destroyed with no regard
-Plywood, container buildings everywhere
The list goes on and on......
Past governments including VIP has messed up but the problems can be rectify differently without all this direct rule, their is a bigger agenda here interwoven with the recommendations. Now we have insulted our forefathers and quite frankly we have not grown up since 1834, it appears we don't have the ability to think and produce, we couldn't come up with any meaningful solution to rectify our problems. It appears we are happy that someone is coming up with the solutions for us, nothing never changed. Self hatred is real.
This is just a VINO article based on..... what????
We haven't seen the proposal ourselves and no public meetings have been called to discuss them yet.
Be calm, and wait to see if what is being said is actually so, and then respond.
Dont get all worked up and emotional about this. It's a NEWS ARTICLE, not the Gospel.
Calm down.