The Observer wishes to add to the debate regarding the recently paved road at Cane Garden. From the outset, we do not agree with the writer involving the person in question’s children and any unflattering comment, although we admit that the article has stirred debate on both sides.
For more than two years the drive and parking lot to our offices at Observer Drive have been partly impassable. This resulted from the Nevis Island Administration attempt to building a drain to stop our neighbour below, Mr. Moving’s house from being flooded. The drain was improperly built, therefore Mr. Moving continues to get flooded out.
We have written to the Premier about the situation. He did not even reply. We have spoken to Mr. Perkins the Minister of Work about one hundred times. All we get is one promise after another. The last person we spoke to was the Clerk of Works Mr. Danny Williams.
We paid Mr. Lee’s backhoe services to fill the area with some soil to at least make it passable.
The administration took a strip of our land, used our land when the road was being fixed. In exchange (according to the then Permanent Secretary Mr. Bailey) the government would pave the forecourt to our office.
Yet after two years and a hundred promises customers meet us and say “I had some business for you but I took it elsewhere because I ‘fraid to drive me car in your yard.”
But we have a clear understanding of what’s going on. The Administration is attempting to put us out of business. If they make the access to our office impassable and send the most of their printing overseas, encourage our staff to work for them, then we will have to shut down.
If the Government is going to use the country’s resources to pave a road for any reason other than providing adequate infrastructure for the island’s residents then it would be wrong. If the Administration is going to look after any of us then it should look after all of us.
The Premier would have failed as leader of this country if he allowed any Minister of his cabinet to attempt to destroy any business on Nevis whether it is locally owned or not.
What is right and decent is right and decent. Mr. Moving got flooded out because of the way Kahrafi constructed the road. It is government’s responsibility to fix it. The administration destroyed the access to our offices and they ought to fix it. Bailey brought his proposal for the exchange for pavement and we accepted.
It is government’s obligation to correct the problem. We went from the Premier right down to the Clerk of Works. We await the next step in this most interesting issue.
