CARIBBEAN ROUNDUP
Antigua
The Antigua and Barbuda government
said a meeting with officials of
the Bank of Nova Scotia will take place
later this month after initially indicating
that the bank had turned down the
request for talks regarding the sale of
its branch holdings on the island.
Government Chief of Staff Lionel
“Max” Hurst speaking on Point FM
radio, owned by Prime Minister Gaston
Browne had said that
the general manager
of Scotia Bank, Suzan
Snaggs-Wilson had
responded to Browne’s
request for the meeting
this month.
In November last year, the Trinidad
based Republic Financial Holdings
Limited (RFHL) announced that it was
seeking to acquire Scotiabank operations
in several Caribbean countries.
Antigua and Barbuda and Guyana
have expressed reservations about the
proposed acquisition, with the St John’s
government indicating that it would
not be issuing a vesting order to facilitate
the move.
A RFHL statement said that the
banks being acquired are located in
Guyana, St. Maarten, Anguilla, Antigua
and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St.
Kitts and Nevis St. Lucia and St. Vincent
and the Grenadines.
Barbados
The Barbados government has put a
four-year freeze on borrowing even as it
reported an improvement in the island’s
economic position.
Minister of Economic Affairs, Marsha
Caddle said that the Barbados government
will not be borrowing any
new funds since it had
borrowed along with
$2 billion of new Barbadian
savings that
were drawn into and
trapped by government debt.
Speaking at the 2019 planning conference
for the Barbados Association of
Insurance and Financial Advisors, said
the island’s debt had already declined
near from 170 percent of gross domestic
product (GDP) in May last year to 124
percent.
She said last May, reserves stood at
Bds$400 million, but the government’s
US$290 million External Fund Facility
(EFF) agreement with the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) and other international
financial agencies including
the Inter-American Development Bank
had helped to improve the economic
situation in Barbados.
St. Lucia
Prime Minister, Allen Chastanet
has defended the performance of the
St. Lucia Police Force saying that his
Caribbean L 4 ife, Jan. 25–31, 2019
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In this April 25, 2013, fi le photo, visitors walk on the white sand of the Grand Anse Beach, Grenada. More than 500,000 visitors traveled
to the island last year. Associated Press / David McFadden, File
administration has been seeking to provide
the necessary resources for law
officials to carry out their duties.
In a radio and television
broadcast, hours
after the island recorded
its first murder in
2019, Chastanet said
at a time when crime
is on the minds of most St Lucians, his
administration has had to spend much
of the last 30 months sourcing and providing
some of the very basic needs for
the police that were not available when
the government came into office.
Police say they are investigating
the murder of British national, Robert
“Bob” Hathaway whose bloody body was
found at his home in Gros Islet, north of
the island, earlier this month.
Grenada
The Grenada Tourism Authority
(GTA) says the country has achieved a
historic milestone of more than 500,000
visitors to the island last year.
The GTA said that combined cruise,
yachting and stay over arrivals in 2018
were 528,077 representing a 12.90 percent
increase in 2017.
A strong performance was also recorded
in stay over arrivals
with an increase
of 9.97 percent, moving
from 146,375 to
160,970 visitors with
special mention given to the bumper
Christmas season in which a 17 percent
growth was recorded.
Canada recorded the highest growth
rate in 2018 followed by the USA, and
the Caribbean.
Jamaica
Persons who knowingly infect someone
with HIV can be charged with a
criminal offence in Jamaica that is if the
government accepts a recommendation
made by a parliamentary committee
that has been reviewing several pieces
of legislation — the Offences Against
the Person Act, the Sexual Offences
Act, the Domestic Violence Act and the
Child Care and Protection Act- over the
past two years.
The committee acknowledged there
was a deficiency in the law in relation to
the deliberate spreading of HIV — the
virus that causes AIDS
and other sexually
transmitted diseases.
The committee said
the Offences Against
the Person Act should be amended to
make it a criminal offence for someone
who willfully or recklessly infect
a partner with a sexually transmitted
disease, which can affect serious bodily
harm, as in the case in other jurisdictions
including Canada and the United
Kingdom.
It made several other recommendations,
one of them was a deletion of
Section 5 of the Sexual Offences Act,
which contends that rape cannot occur
within the context of a marriage, unless
conditions set out in the provision were
met.
However, it had decided against recommending
a change to the legislation
related to forced penetration because it
could affect existing buggery laws.
St. Kitts
New CARICOM chairman Prime
Minister of St. Kitts and Nevis, Dr. Timothy
Harris says 2019 will be the year
to combat chronic non-communicable
diseases (NCDs) across the region.
He said CARICOM will enter 2019
with “a renewed vigor and determination
to maintain the
momentum which we
ended in 2018.”
The prime minister
added that at the core
of the region’s thrust for growth and
development is a well-educated and
healthy workforce.
Dr. Harris said chronic NCDs are a
threat to the region’s sustainable development
— a concern highlighted at a
recent meeting at the United Nations.
He also noted that 2019 will be the
final year of the region’s strategic plan
and preparations have already begun for
the second plan, which will build on the
accomplishments of its predecessor.
The prime minister said the new year
will be one that is full of action for the
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Historic tourism milestone
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