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  • Dr Lester Simon Chronicles: ‘You Have the Right to Curse my Backside’

Dr Lester Simon Chronicles: ‘You Have the Right to Curse my Backside’

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You Have the Right to Curse my Backside

One Sunday morning, a few years ago, I was driving on High Street.

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At the corner of High Street and Corn Alley I stopped. I stopped because I usually try to stop at all intersections even if I have the right of way. Also, this was a blind corner and some drivers could be blind from time to time so that we could not see eye to eye.

Suddenly, a vehicle zoomed across the intersection from Corn Alley without stopping. It could have crashed into me if I hadn’t stopped.

Trying to be a good citizen, I shouted out to the driver and asked him if he didn’t see the stop sign on the corner on the Corn Alley side of the intersection telling him to stop.

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The man put on a royal, sermonic cursing on me. Talk about communion. Even my vehicle was shocked and couldn’t move. I wanted to curse back his backside and tell him about his entire extended family, alive and dead and dying. But I remembered it was a Sunday morning and that my deceased maternal grandmother might have been listening… and might have been the one who reminded me to stop.

That was years ago. This afternoon, years after that encounter, I was driving down the same High Street and stopped at the same junction with Corn Alley. This time, not one but three vehicles zoomed across the intersection without stopping.

This time it wasn’t a Sunday and this time I wanted to do the cursing, so I shouted out to all three of the drivers, with some colorful, native words, that they should observe the equally colorful, native traffic sign. Talk about a cavalcade of colour.

One of the drivers pointed back to the traffic sign that he saw driving on Corn Alley.My grandmother must have been dusting off and getting ready to come out at night to watch over me. I looked at the sign at the corner. Lord!

All drivers should know that a stop sign is octagonal. Even if you cannot see the front of a stop sign, the octagonal shape tells you it’s a stop sign. All of this traffic geometry is what I wanted to explain to the driver years ago and was about to explain again this evening, three times over.

When I looked at the sign, it was no longer octagonal. It was round! Round, round, round.

Seeing the circular sign I decided to make a circle and to go on to Corn Alley ( a one-way street, like High Street) to see what this sign was. Lo and behold, the sign had a blue background with a white arrow in the middle pointing forward! That’s odd. A blue traffic sign with no red border is a sign of positive instructions. In such a case, it is telling the Corn Alley driver to drive on and ignore idiots like me on High Street.

Not being proud to call myself an idiot and feeling so ashamed for not knowing that the sign had changed, I made another circle and went back on High Street. This time I was looking for the sign on High Street to tell me to stop at the corner with Corn Alley since now anyone can zoom out of the alley from Corn Alley into the intersection and ignore the idiots on High Street. There was no such sign for the High Street drivers. None.

Who made the change? Was it the driver from years ago coming back in some other persona? Was it a crazed UPP supporter who changed the red and white stop sign to the blue and white proceed sign? Were the authorities going to put up the stop sign for the High Street drivers and stopped for some unknown reason?

I am reminded that in England the corn exchange was a meeting place where merchants traded grains. Maybe the junction of High Street and Corn Alley in Antigua is a meeting place to trade bad words.

Please drive carefully. Your deceased grandmother might be fast asleep, waiting on you.

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REQUEST FOR EXPRESSIONS OF INTEREST

(CONSULTING SERVICES – INDIVIDUAL SELECTION)

 

OECS MSME Guarantee Facility Project

Loan No.: IDA-62670, IDA-62660, IDA-62640, IBRD-88830, IDA-62650

Assignment Title: Senior Operating Officer (SOO)

Reference No. KN-ECPCGC-207852-CS-INDV

 

The Governments of Antigua and Barbuda, Commonwealth of Dominica, Grenada, St. Lucia and St. Vincent and the Grenadines have received financing in the amount of US$10 million equivalent from the World Bank towards the cost of establishing a partial credit guarantee scheme, and they intend to apply part of the proceeds to payments for goods, and consulting services to be procured under this project. 

The consultant will serve as the “Senior Operating Officer (SOO)” for the ECPCGC and should possess extensive knowledge of MSME lending with some direct experience lending to Micro, small and medium-sized businesses, knowledge of the internal control processes necessary for a lending operation and the ability to design and implement risk mitigation procedures. The ideal candidate should possess an Undergraduate Degree from a reputable college or university, preferably in Business, Accounting, Banking or related field, with a minimum of 5 years’ experience in lending, inclusive of MSME lending. The initial employment period will be for two years on a contractual basis. Renewal of the contract will be subject to a performance evaluation at the end of the contractual period. The assignment is expected to begin on September 30th, 2021.  The consultant will report directly to the Chief Executive Officer of the ECPCGC.

The detailed Terms of Reference (TOR) for the assignment can be viewed by following the attached link below. 

 

https://bit.ly/3iVannm

 

The Eastern Caribbean Partial Credit Guarantee Corporation (ECPCGC) now invites eligible “Consultants” to indicate their interest in providing the Services. Interested Consultants should provide information demonstrating that they have:

  • An Undergraduate Degree from a reputable college or university, preferably in Business, Finance, Banking or related field; and
  • Minimum of 5 years’ experience in MSME lending. Applicants should also have:
  • The ability to design and implement risk management procedures 
  • Extensive knowledge of MSME lending with some direct experience lending to small and medium-sized businesses
  • Extensive knowledge of MSME banking operations
  • Knowledge of the internal controls necessary for a lending operation and the ability to design and implement risk management procedures
  • Experience developing and presenting information in public, including responding to questions in real-time
  • Experience lending to MSMEs located in the ECCU
  • Knowledge of marketing and communicating with the MSME sector
  • Ability to draft procedures to be used in a lending operation
  • Familiarity with the mechanics of a loan guarantee program
  • Exceptional written, oral, interpersonal, and presentation skills, and
  • Proficiency in the use of Microsoft Office suite.

The attention of interested Individual Consultants is drawn to Section III, Paragraphs 3.14, 3.16, and 3.17 of the World Bank’s Procurement Regulations for IPF Borrowers July 2016, [revised November 2017] (“Procurement Regulations”), setting forth the World Bank’s policy on conflict of interest. A Consultant will be selected in accordance with the Approved Selection Method for Individual Consultants set out in the clause 7.34 of the World Bank Procurement Regulations for IPF Borrowers. 

 

Further information can be obtained at the address below during office hours 0800 to 1700 hours:

Eastern Caribbean Partial Credit Guarantee Corporation

Brid Rock, Basseterre,

St. Kitts.

Expressions of interest must be delivered in a written form by e-mail by August 11th, 2021, to [email protected]

 

For further information, please contact:

Carmen Gomez-Trigg                                                            Bernard Thomas

Chief Executive Officer                                                          Chief Financial Officer

Tel: 868-620-8144                                                                  Tel: 869-765-2385

Email: [email protected]                                          [email protected]