ROSEAU, Dominica, Aug 02 2017 – The Director General of the Eastern Caribbean Civil Aviation Authority (ECCAA), Donald McPhail, has held talks with the Dominica government on the development plans for an international airport for the island.
A brief government statement noted that the meeting took place on the fringes of the parliamentary debate on the 2017/2018 national budget now underway here.
It said that the talks were also attended by President Charles Savarin.
“Very soon the government shall invite a wide cross section of the population to provide an update. For the project to be successful we will need the fullest cooperation of all,” Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit is quoted as saying in the statement.
During his budget presentation last week, Skerrit told legislators that his administration had advanced plans for the development of the international airport and established an airport development fund as of May 2017.
He said the fund “has been capitalized with US$10 million from the Citizenship by Investment Programme (CIP),” which allows investors to make financial contributions to the socio-economic development of the island in return for citizenship.
“Government has taken the decision that an amount of five million US dollars will be paid into that fund on a monthly basis,” Skerrit added.
Earlier this year, Skerrit said that a United States-based firm that conducted conduct studies for the construction of the international airport, would present its findings to Cabinet.
Skerrit first announced plans were afoot to construct an international airport in May 2014. Since then, government has had discussions with a Chinese team for the construction of the international airport at Crompton Point, north-east of here.
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