“A bit bizarre”.
That was the term used by Chief of Staff in the Prime Minister’s Office Lionel
‘Max’ Hurst to address the recent news that the three women who were
interested in building a crematorium in the country would have pulled out.
Earlier this week, the CYW International team comprising Shelley Challenger,
Minnelle Williams, and Shari Yearwood expressed their concerns over what
they deem as a breach of confidentiality.
“At the core of our concerns is the unfortunate breach of confidentiality that
resulted in the leaking of our detailed business proposal to the media,” the team
reportedly mentioned over the weekend to another media house.
The CYW International team had been hopeful that they could bring this
initiative to fruition, but the leaking of their business plan compromised the
project’s integrity and publicly exposed sensitive information that was intended
for the government’s eyes only.
The entrepreneurs felt that this act significantly undermined their trust in the
project, and they could no longer execute this initiative with full confidence.
But Hurst believes that no such breach happened.
He said the information shared was only ‘surface level’ data and should be
announced to keep the public informed.
“They have issued a statement which we find far from rational. Clearly, there
was nothing unusual about what had been written in the report or in the
submission to the Cabinet. They are not private documents; this is not a deal
that required the Antigua and Barbuda government to remain tight-lipped.
“In fact, we had to reveal what we were doing with these three women if we
were not to be unfair to the existing two funeral homes. So, it is a little strange
that they would argue that the reason that they are pulling out is because we
shared the document with members of the media. This is what we do and the
Antigua and Barbuda government under the Prime Minister Gaston Browne
does not have secrets, especially so having to do with any kind of commercial
arrangements between itself and others.
“When negotiations are in a delicate stage, we might withhold something until
such time but that would not have been the case in this matter,” Hurst said.
According to CYW, the lack of effective communication between the
government and themselves also played a factor in the team pulling out.
Originally, the government had turned to the two local funeral homes to assist
but the administration later told reporters that the cost of operating the facility
seemed to have cooled interest from their owners.
Sometime later, Cabinet announced that the trio proposed to construct a
crematorium, the first of its kind in Antigua and Barbuda. The women’s plan
included building a crematorium, a garden, a chapel, and a nice place where
urns could be kept.
The three Toronto-based women had several decades of experience in the
crematorium industry and were willing to invest up to US$3.5 million.
