Mayreau elects local committee to oversee rebuilding after Beryl

Residents of Mayreau have elected a seven-member committee to oversee reconstruction on the Southern Grenadines island following the devastating impact of Hurricane Beryl on July 1.

The committee was elected on Aug. 3 as islanders say that they have been neglected by the government, five weeks after the category 4 cyclone damaged or destroyed 95% of buildings in the Southern Grenadines.

Eleven people were nominated to serve on the committee and the seven who received the most votes were chosen as its members

They are Desmond Lewis, Phillman Ollivierre, Zannie Adams, Munro Forde, Madonna Richardson, Keon Forde and James Alexander.

The committee was elected even as the island, which usually has 300 residents, remains without cellular or fixed-line telecommunication services, and a few streetlights operational.

Mobile data services are provided by Starlink points, some of which are privately owned.

This week, Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves said 44 people were in shelters in Mayreau, part of the 1,331 people in emergency 72 shelters in St. Vincent and the Grenadines as of July 31.

Lewis, the VINLEC operator on the island who also owns D-View, a restaurant on Saline Bay, received the most votes. 

He told iWitness News on Thursday that the committee was organised to rebuild roofs and homes in Mayreau.

“… we’ve been here for the longest while, and we haven’t had no talk with nobody from the ministry, nobody from the government or anything like that,” Lewis said. 

“And we don’t know how long they are gonna take to come through this because we think it’s long enough. So, we organise a team, a group, based on the support that we’re getting and we decide we want to go ahead and start helping people get back into their homes.”

Lewis said the group is organising and managing building materials arriving on the island, adding that shipments of materials from Barbados and St. Vincent were expected to arrive in Mayreau over the next few days.  

The committee will also decide on how to prioritise the rebuilding of the homes.

“That’s how we go forward in doing things because really and truly, we cannot wait no longer on the government to come in while people are so uncomfortable in shelters, and being in a couple of places that they have.”

He said that the committee is focused on repairing the homes that will result in people moving out of the primary school, which is being used as an emergency shelter.

“… we want our children to go to school,” Lewis said. “We’re still waiting on people in the government, from Housing, to do something, come and talk to us and say something to us, because what we’re having now, as far as I am concerned, is people that we are asking for donations from.”

Gov’t plan not known

Asked how the local efforts on the island fit into the government’s rebuilding plan, Lewis told iWitness News:

“Well, that’s the problem. We do not know what plan the government has because no one has come here to talk to us. So, we don’t know what’s their plan and how long they’re going to put a plan in place for us.”

Lewis said things have improved in Mayreau five weeks after the hurricane, adding that in the immediate aftermath, people did not know how to move forward.

“… before any payment came for the cleaning up, we actually got together, had a meeting and decided we’re gonna start cleaning up ourselves,” he said.

“Even when Canouan and Union started getting paid to clean up, we were cleaning by ourselves like that, self-help because we got concerned about our community so we take the initiative of getting together and do this thing because it was that horrible,” he said, mentioning the two other southern Grenadine islands ravaged by the storm.

“… a week after Beryl, I was confused. Now, I look at Mayreau and I see where we are going forward. And it’s sad to say, but I can’t even say thanks to the government as yet, because they haven’t even showed up here to talk with the people. Except for today, we had some people from tourism come in. I think on their behalf, that’s weak, it’s poor, it’s not nice.”

Lewis said electricity has been restored from the power station to the clinic.

“We have a few streetlights that we put in to help put some light in the village. We’re also having a team supposed to be coming in from tomorrow (Friday),” he said of the island that was left without electricity after the hurricane.

He said that if things go as hoped, all the preparatory work for reconnecting the electricity in the village could be completed by the end of the week.

Lewis said a team from the private firm contracted by VINLEC to restore the electricity distribution system was on the island.

“We basically done plant all the poles. We just have a few more, like maybe three or four, just to straighten up.

“So, when they come, all these things already been in place. It’s just to run lines, put up transformers and ready to put out current to customers. So, where electricity is concerned, we are doing well.”

He said islanders have received “some foreign help” to cover the roofs of the homes of people who want to leave the shelters and return to their homes.

“So, we have a group from overseas that are helping us with that,” Lewis said, adding that the group, from the United States, comes to the island from time to time on private missions but is assisting the public to repair roofs.

Health centre also a priority

He said that electricity was restored to the health centre because islanders saw this as a priority.

Lewis said that even before the committee was formed, residents would meet to discuss issues on the island and saw the clinic as a priority.

“And it was an issue that came about after Beryl, one of the first things that the government should have paid attention to was the clinic.

“We had also get the same tarpaulin team to cover it … The clinic leaking; it needs repair. They need a generator,” he said, adding that the nurse is now providing health services from the centre where relief supplies are stored.

 “… the nurse, before she went to the centre, she was operating at her home.  And in the night, it’s dark, she didn’t even have a generator. Not even some light that if someone got injured and they came there, she had some light to tend to them.

“And this is bad. I’m saying because these are a priority. These are a priority. This was totally, totally bad.”

Lewis said this was the situation although the nurse had certain items that had to be kept refrigerated.

“Lucky for her, we were able to get one our generators started up and get power at the power station so she could have brought her stuff down there, and they were cold.

“But she has a fridge at home and a generator, that there was — I don’t want to talk about the generator that was donated. The government — and I am going stress on that — the government should have put these things in place. These are priorities. These are priorities.

“Just like how we see the opening of school as a priority and we’re going to do what we can off ah we own to get it, I think this is a priority that they should take the initiative of looking after,” Lewis told iWitness News.

He said they were first able to access the internet after the storm when yachties from Martinique donated  Starlink sets.

“They are the ones who see it fit that we should have it. We didn’t get anything from the government yet … not even FLOW or Digicel.

“FLOW or Digicel hasn’t come here yet,” he said, referring to the telecommunication providers, which have said that their services will be restored after electricity is returned to the islands.

“The NTRC (National Telecommunications Regulatory Commission) came in after. So, they probably have, I think, two or three Starlinks here. We were here for a while without internet or any means of communicating with anybody outside of Mayreau.”

Lewis, however, acknowledged that the government has repaired a breach at Mayreau’s world-famous Salt Whistle Bay, which is the main tourism asset on the island.

“That’s the only quick thing they work on. And I gotta say it. The work on Salt Whistle Bay, because I think they know the kind of income that they’re pulling from Salt Whistle Bay. Mayreau brings in a lot of income to the government.

“They all know that. And if they lose that beach, they lose a great deal. So, I believe that’s why they put so much effort and interest into Salt Whistle Bay.”