British Virgin Islands

Virgin Islands students have a chance to learn about boating next month — for free.

Throughout July, the youth programme Kids and the Sea will host four one-week summer camps for ages 10-16 at the H. Lavity Stoutt Community College’s Centre for Applied Marine Studies and other venues on Tortola.

Each session will accommodate 28 students, who must have competent swimming abilities and be comfortable in the water, according to KATS, which is hosting the camps with support from Unite BVI and HLSCC.

After two years of muted celebrations during the Covid-19 pandemic, plans are underway to hold the August Emancipation Festival from July 24 to Aug. 5 under the slogan “Celebrate Freedom for Me and You, BVI Festival 2022,” the Virgin Islands Festivals and Fairs Committee announced Tuesday.

Forty-eight of 49.

That’s how many Commission of Inquiry recommendations the new National Unity Government has pledged to complete over the next two years under the proposal recently agreed with the United Kingdom. If it succeeds, UK leaders have promised to abandon the remaining COI recommendation to impose direct rule as they have done to force reforms in other overseas territories.

SOL will step in to provide No. 2 Diesel fuel and other services to the BVI Electricity Corporation through 2024, after the utility’s original contract with Delta Petroleum was terminated last month amid a public dispute in which Delta and BVIEC accused each other of making misleading statements.

The SOL bid was opened on June 2 during a streamed ceremony attended by BVIEC board members and senior management as well as representatives from SOL and the media.

The annual Junior Ambassador of Tourism oratory competition on Tuesday crowned its 11th champion, who will represent the Virgin Islands in the Tourism Youth Congress in the Cayman Islands in September.

Desha Skelton from Elmore Stoutt High School won the honour after scoring the highest for her speeches on tourism in the territory.

After working on his sailboat into the evening of June 2, Nick Buckell returned to the mooring field at St. Thomas Bay, Virgin Gorda, the following morning to find that the 30-foot mono-hull had disappeared.

He searched the harbour and other parts of the territory to no avail and filed a police report at the Virgin Gorda station, he told the Beacon.

It was a night of pirouettes, croisés and pliés during the annual BVI DanceFest on Sunday at the H. Lavity Stoutt Community College, where young dancers took the stage at the Eileene L. Parsons Auditorium to showcase what they’ve learned over the past year.

“These dancers will perform en pointe after the waltz, then the Dying Swan will finish with a fast-paced finale of pirouettes,” said emcee and BVI Dance School alumna Alecia Penn before the sixth act of the night.

Then six dancers took the stage dressed in black feathered costumes to perform four parts of a swan saga.

Former Premier Andrew Fahie was released from the Federal Detention Center in Miami on Monday pending his trial after his lawyer and prosecutors argued over his bond for more than a month, according to the United States Bureau of Prisons website.

Mr. Fahie’s hearing and release came after Albion “Bobby” Hodge, a prominent Virgin Islands businessman and Mr. Fahie’s childhood friend, last Thursday agreed to post his $500,000 corporate surety bond and satisfy that bond’s Nebbia requirement by proving the money was not the proceeds of crime.

Along with the broader governance reforms laid out in the proposal, the National Unity Government committed to an extensive list of deadlines for carrying out recommendations included in the Commission of Inquiry report.

Below are some of the commitments that are expected to have the widest impact, and the dates for implementation.

Virgin Islands animal shelter manager Vijay Bissoondutt has received an honourary Member of the British Empire award from the Queen for his contributions to animal welfare in the territory, the Governor’s Group announced June 1.

Mr. Bissoondutt joined the Humane Society of the BVI at the age of 16 in 1995, working to help support then-shelter manager Tessa Gunter. After Ms. Gunter’s death in 2013, he took over the position.

The non-profit animal shelter consistently operates at maximum capacity and relies on fundraising events through the year in order to function.