November 2013
| Business World Magazine | 143
“Inland Revenue” officers who, in turn, were
to provide that money to the Authority. This
created something of a major conflict during
the very time when Anguilla was preparing
to enhance critical infrastructure.There were
plans to establish a new passenger terminal
at a site known as Blowing Point, as well as
plans to extend the airport landing strip to
accommodate larger flights, and more – but
all that came to a screeching halt in the wake
of sudden fiscal constraints. To explain that
requires understanding that almost half of
AASPA revenue was anticipated to come
from collection of the Embarkation Tax. Yet
in 2011, the Government decided it would
only hand over 50% of that tax and only on
a quarterly basis. The Authority was sudden-
ly denied a crucial element of funding. Ac-
cording to the EU findings, the autonomy
initially envisioned had diminished into an
ongoing pattern of government micro-man-
agement which culminated with a number
of the AASPA Board resigning their posts.
In fact, the ability to move forward was fur-
ther hindered by the AASPA’s inability to
secure the required government approval of
its business plan. For the last two years, the
AASPA has been stymied from acting on the
very strategy it had devised to generate prof-
its andmove forward on the enhancing of in-
frastructure – but that’s all about to change.
A POSITIVE OUTLOOK
For his part, Rogers is not one inclined to
talk about negative politics or problems
arising from government interference; he
says the AASPA is more focused on finding
solutions than finding someone to blame
for roadblocks to progress. That EU study
(titled “Support to the Anguilla Air and
Sea Port Authority”) not only identified
challenges, but offered a range of solutions
which have since been adopted by AASPA.
Measures call for a new management struc-
ture to AASPA, the formation of commit-
