Following an explosive public row between Premier Natalio “Sowande” Wheatley and his counterpart in the United States Virgin Islands over planned fee hikes for charter boats, both leaders announced this week that nearly all their differences have been resolved.
Speaking Tuesday after a second round of “intense” talks with USVI Governor Albert Bryan Jr., the premier said the stand-off is “95 percent” sorted out.
In a joint Facebook broadcast from St. Thomas, where they met, the two leaders said they will continue discussions on remaining sticking points and form a joint marine task force to guide the way forward.
The stance was very different in tone to relations in February, when Mr. Wheatley accused the governor of “Trump-like bullying” after Mr. Bryan threatened 25 percent tariffs if the premier went ahead with fee hikes.
‘Genuinely impressed’
Mr. Wheatley, who led prayers at the opening of the two-and-a-half-hour meeting on Tuesday, said that concessions had been made on both sides.
“I was genuinely impressed with Governor Bryan and his team’s compassion for the people of the United States Virgin Islands to ensure that he secured their best interests through negotiations,” Mr. Wheatley said. “But not just that: the level of understanding to us on the BVI side in terms of our need to raise fees to maintain our economy. I would say that we have agreed, probably, about 95 percent of what needs to be agreed.”
Mr. Wheatley made it clear the VI had given ground.
“We did make some level of concessions based on friendship and based on the robust negotiation from the USVI,” he said. “Possibly, there may be more concessions to come once we go back and crunch the numbers.”
New fee levels
During the Facebook appearance, Mr. Bryan agreed that the talks had been fair.
“I feel great,” he said. “I think one of the things that’s essential in terms of negotiations is that both parties walk away a little bit uncomfortable. And that means it was a fair negotiation.”
The governor added that the disparity between charter fees in the two territories needs to be carefully considered.
“We looked at an option where there is unlimited access, but there’s a cost for that, and I think that negotiation went back and forth, but we settled on a number that I think both of us can live with,” he said. “We are not competitors, we are collaborators.”
Yesterday morning, the premier told the Beacon that new fee levels would be announced later in the day, but they had not been released by Beacon press time yesterday afternoon.
Previous meeting
After their initial war of words, the two leaders moved to tone down the rhetoric with a previous meeting on the issue on Tortola on March 7.
Mr. Wheatley has strongly defended plans put before the House of Assembly in January seeking to increase annual charter fees for USVI boats that operate here by up to 6,000 percent.
In support of the move, he has noted that the charges have not been raised since 1992 and claimed that the charter business generates almost $100 million annually for the USVI economy.
The premier put the proposed legislation on hold while talks continued, but he has stressed he wants it to go through the House by June.
Mr. Wheatley has also faced criticism of the planned reforms, though not the fee levels, from operators based in this territory, and he has been holding public meetings to discuss the situation.
British Caribbean News