TNAG-0828-FCO40-1036-Dependent-Territories-Senior-Appointments-Board--1979-1979 — Page 171

As Gregors 0217/2

CONF

CONFIDENTIAL

STAFF IN CONFIDENCE

LAST

Pr.

Mr McLaren, HK&GD

be you

។

HKA 431/2 (Annose)

RECEIVED INE

13 FEB 1979

Mr Forster Mr Hall

Mr Posnett

No

Mr Duff

Mr Shakespeare

without enclo-

sure

A

B

A

GOVERNORSHIP OF BELIZE AND CAYMAN ISLANDS

1. Mr Posnett's minute to Mr Forster of 29 January (not to all).

2. I sounded Mr Russell, on a personal and informal basis and with- out commitment on either side, about his willingness to take on the governorship of Belize if the 60 agelimit (I think Mr Russell is 60 in May 1980) should prove no impediment. After thinking it over for two days, but without as far as I know consulting his wife who was in France, he said he would be so willing if required mainly I think from a sense of public duty. I understand, however, that the Opposition in Belize is unlikely to renounce independence, as opposed to putting it in limbo for a few years, and that it would therefore be very difficult for a governor, however experienced, to claw back for himself any of the powers that have been delegated to Ministers. It seems possible therefore - though Mr Posnett will know better than any of us

that an experienced colonial administrator may not be as essential as Mr McEntee suggested. Moreover, although Mr Russell undoubtedly falls into this category, I am not sure that his experience hitherto would necessarily fit him for the external side of this job involving in particular the Guatemalans and the Americans. make him unacceptable to Ministers.

་

This might

3. A further difficulty is that, in addition to the outstanding request from the Caymanians for Mr Russell's tenure to be extended until May 1980, I received when I was in Grand Cayman last week a letter from the elected members of the Legislative Assembly, to which I have sent a stalling reply, requesting Mr Russell's extension until well into 1981 after the next elections in the territory. This plea will make it that much more difficult to find an acceptable successor for the experienced, and locally prized, Mr Russell if we wish to do so in the next few months.

4.

With great respect I doubt whether Mr Lloyd would make a suitable replacement. The present Caymanian Members are a hard-hitting bunch of entrepreneurial businessmen who have little time for civil servants as their employees, let alone as a master. Mr Lloyd is an accomplished administrator and bureaucrat I mean this in no derogatory sense

-

I am pretty sure he would not hit it off with them.

but

5. Subject to the views of other recipients of this minute I suggest therefore that the best solution for the time being might be to extend Mr Russell in the Cayman Islands until May 1980 (with the usual "exigencies of the service" clause) and in due course to send a substantive, but equally non-committal, reply to the elected members' letter to me of 31 January. Belize is not really my affair, but I derived the impression from Mr McEntee that from a sense of public duty he would be content to soldier on for a few months after the forthcoming elections and so give us time to find a successor.

Li. Shatten

R J Stratton

8 February 1979

CONFIDENTIAL STAFF IN CONFIDENCE