Indian Ocean Invasion - 15. IOI Chapter 15

When I did some more searching online, I also found a jet boat, that is 18 metres long, with seating for 38 passengers with a bottom glass viewing area, bathroom and kitchen which I thought would be perfect for tourists.

Mindful that the federal government or the local government wouldn’t want to fork out 395 thousand dollars. Instead, I used all of what I had saved up and convinced my half-brother – Jeremy, to come in partnership, with a 2/3’s share, and we boat the boat, and had it shipped from Greece.

This boat could be used as a backup ferry boat, as it can have a cruising speed of 36 km’s per hour, when the other boat is having maintenance, or is not working. I am hoping that with these boats, it would allow the Chagos community to travel between the islands to keep in touch with one another, as one big community.

I hoped to be able to get together regularly, once it was agreed by the chief’s council to celebrate a total of 23 holidays, 6 Australian Public Holidays, 7 Christian, 7 Hindi and 3 Buddhist religious holidays.

It was also agreed that on St Patricks day in mid – March, that it would also be Chagos Day, to celebrate the return to their homelands. Once of the other jobs I was negotiating, is to have a twice weekly commercial flight to come to the Chagos Archipelago, to promote tourism but in the meantime, the Chagos Council administration was completing setting up a Website to promote sailors to visit the islands.

Although it was agreed by the chiefs to accept Australian law, as the form of Law and order, it also recognised that being a remote location, it also had to insist on some very strict environmental laws to protect the islands nature and income from fishing.

With the Maldives being just 600 km’s to the north, as its nearest neighbour, it was decided by the Chiefs that a 100 km economic exclusion zone be established to protect the waters of the Chagos Archipelago, especially from over fishing of the area. With one Australian Naval patrol boat based at Diego Garcia, it was up to them to patrol this area, to make sure that these rules were being enforced.

With a 2 ½ hour time difference with Perth Western Australia, and 4 ½ hours with Canberra, I had to have three clocks put in the reception area of my administration building, to keep track of the different time zones. One day in mid-July, just past four months since moving to the islands, and just two weeks after the arrival of the jet boat and the other boats, I received a call from Jeremy.

“When you spoke to me, and asked help to buy a jet boat to promote better tourism options on the island last month, I thought you were talking about the Cocos Keeling Islands, but now I have an invoice to say that the Jet boat was delivered to Diego Garcia, the new Indian Ocean Territory of Australia, what the hell bro?” Jeremy said in an annoyed and angry tone, when I answered the call.

“Yeah about that, I was almost on my way back to the mainland, when I was called to take up a very important position on the Chagos Archipelago, as it is known. Diego Garcia is just the largest island on the chain of islands” I responded.

“Ok, so what the hell is this job that is so important, that has taken you another 2000 kilometres away from the mainland, in the middle of nowhere” Jeremy asked still sounding angry.

“Do you have a computer in front of you, and turned on?” I asked, “Yeah, why do you ask?” Jeremy replied cautiously, “Just humour me for a moment, enter this web address, www.aph.gov.au then click on ‘About Parliament’, then click on ‘Work of the Parliament’, have you got that so far?” I said.

“Yeah, yeah, but what is this leading to, it is all stupid politics as far as I am concerned” Jeremy snapped, and I chuckled softly, “Patients bro, be patient, right now click on ‘Forming and Governing a Nation, and on that page, you will see 6 dot points, click on the one that says ‘State Governors and Administrators’, then tell me what you read under the heading of Chagos Archipelago Islands” I said.

“Bloody hell is this correct, it says that you are the Administrator of the new Territory?” Jeremy said to me, “As I said before, I was asked to take up an important position, and that is why I am here” I responded. “It says here, ‘The Honourable Commander Lewis Shaw CVO, VC, DSC, what are all the letters about? Plus, I thought you were a Lt Commander?” Jeremy said to me.

“Well when I was given this job, I was promoted to a full Commander, transferred to Navy Reserves for the time I am here, and the rest are honours that I have received” I replied.

“Wait, the VC, isn’t the…” Jeremy started to say and I interrupted him, “Yes the Victoria Cross, I received it when I was in Afghanistan, when I was injured and helping the others out of the vehicle after we hit an IED, the other one is the Distinguished Service Cross, for what I did on Christmas Island, and the CVO, is the Commander of the Victorian Order” I responded.

“Wait you mean like a knighthood?” Jeremy asked sounding shocked, and I chuckled, “Not quite, one level down from a knighthood” I replied, “Bloody hell” Jeremy responded, and I gave a short laugh at his reaction. “I guess you can say I work in Public Service now, not that I wanted too” I said, as I thought back at how quickly everything happened.

“So how do I get there, so Mitchell and I can come and visit?” Jeremy asked, “that is something that I have been working on for the past month, to try and encourage tourism to the islands, but because it is so remote, Virgin Airways don’t want to know about it, there are flights from Columbo, Sri Lanka and from Kula Lumpur, Malaysia to the Maldives Island, which is about 600 km’s north of Chagos Archipelago” I replied.

“Oh, so how do you get supplies to you?” Jeremy asked, “By ship mostly which is a 12-day journey from Perth, the Federal Government has a cargo contract with a Western Australian shipping company, to deliver supplies once every six weeks. Anything urgent, is flown in by the RAAF, which must stop to refuel at the Cocos Keeling Islands” I replied, just as I thought of a brilliant idea.

“Well I don’t have time to sail on a ship to see you, so I guess we will have to wait till something better comes up, I will talk again soon bro” Jeremy said, “Ok mate, and say hello to Mitchell for me, bye” I said and ended the call, and I went online to find the Corporate Head office of Qantas, which I found to be is Mascot, Sydney.

“Hello, this is Lewis Shaw, administrator of the Chagos Archipelago Territory of Australia, I wish to speak to someone, regarding a proposal for a different stop over on European flights” I said when the call was answered, “Is this is a prank call or something, because I am not amused” came a response on the other end of the line.

“No this is not a crank call, if you like you can, check the Australian government website, where it lists who the current State Governors and Territory Administrators are, then call me back” I responded and hung up the phone annoyed at the attitude of the lady at Qantas.

A good ten minutes later, the telephone rang, and my assistant answered the call, “Good afternoon, Chagos Archipelago Administrators office, how may I assist you today… one moment please, I will put you through” I heard my assistant say, and the phone on my desk rang.

“Administrator Lewis Shaw speaking” I said when I picked up the phone, “Sir… Mr Shaw, I am terribly sorry at how you were treated with your call earlier, I have already spoken to the young lady concerned, and it won’t happen again. My name is Rachel Yates, assistant director of Corporate business, how may I help you today” the caller said to me.

“Thank you for your return call Ms Yates, now the reason I have called is in regard to the Territory that I reside in, unlike the Administrator of the Cocos Keeling Island and Christmas Island, I do actually reside where I work, you may also be aware that it has been just four months since I began my appointment, soon after the transfer of ownership took place” I began.

“Yes sir, I have been following the news stories with interest, although there is not much about it, apart from official information from the Federal government in Canberra” Ms Yates replied.

“Well I can tell you that the main island of Diego Garcia, which is now only part defence base, and the remainder is Community land, compared to when the Americans were running it, we are 5255 kilometres from Perth, which if there was a direct flight to here, would take 7 hours, and 8,530 km’s from Sydney, which would take 11 hours.

Now we have no commercial flights to the island, only an occasional RAAF flight when need be, what we don’t have is easy access to the outside world. What I am proposing, is that Qantas consider, Diego Garcia as a stopping point for your flights to Europe, with London being 9,455 kilometres from Diego Garcia” I suggested.

“Well that is a very interesting proposal, I will definitely suggest this to the board at their next meeting, and let you know the outcome” Ms Yates replied, “Direct, Polite and honest, I like that. I look forward to our next conversation, goodbye till then Ms Yates” I said before ending the call.

The rest of the week went smoothly for me, with two community meetings, one in the main town of Diego Garcia, and the other on Boddam Island, and I would be travelling on the jet boat for the first time, which will take 4 hours to reach the most northern islands of the Archipelago, in open ocean waters, and we towed four of the fishing boats with us, to drop off there. The journey north was a little rough, but it was worth the trip.

I was given a warm welcome from the whole community, and the boats were greatly received, before I attended the community meeting, to discuss any issues, and to attend a formal dinner, before staying overnight with one of the local families, and returning to the main island the following day.

I will be doing similar trips to the Egmont Islands, and again to the Three Brothers and Eagle Islands, for community meetings and a formal dinner, with plans to do these trips every three months, to keep in touch with what is happening in each area.

When I was invited to attend the next Chief Council meeting, I was informed that my visit to the northern Islands was appreciated, and that I would be welcome to return at any time, which I was glad to hear.

I was also informed that a name had been chosen for the main town on Diego Garcia, which will become the capital of the Archipelago, and the name chosen is Catalina, after a Catalina flying boat, that was destroyed during a cyclone in September 1944.

Back at my office, I wrote a report on my visit to the northern islands, and what was discussed at the community meeting, plus a briefing on what was discussed at the recent Chief Council meeting, including the selected name for the capital of the Chagos Archipelago, and I emailed it to Canberra.

Over the next two months, I worked hard with the community, to get all the necessary community facilities and more housing built to accommodate the expected total of 3500 permanent residents on the island, along with several cafes, plus two hotels with 40 rooms each, on Diego Garcia, and one other hotel located on Egmont Island with just 12 rooms, to accommodate tourists, that are starting to flow into the region.

Although I was not successful with getting any Australian Airlines to have flights stop at Diego Garcia, I did manage to get a regional Airline from India, to extend its usual flights from Columbo, Sri Lanka, to Male, Maldives Islands, which is a 1 ½ hour flight and travel a further 2 hours, south to Diego Garcia, in the Chagos Islands.

The only flights to Columbo, from Australia are with a stopover in Singapore, which means 4 individual flights from Perth taking nearly two days including the stop overs in Singapore, Columbo and the Maldives. We are also getting a lot of yachts visiting the islands, which is an extra bonus.

With all the pressures of working in this job, I often found it very overwhelming, and for the past few weeks, I had been considering my future, and now had made the decision to hand in my resignation, with 6-weeks-notice. A few days later, I received a return email from Canberra.

“We regretfully accept your resignation, although we are disappointed that you have decided to leave the post as Administrator of Chagos Archipelago, we thank you for all of your hard work in the past 15 months that you have been there.

We have received feedback from recent tourist visitors, who have visited the islands, and they informed us, that they had a wonderful time on the island, and that the Chagos Islanders are very warm and friendly people, and we think that, this is mainly because of the work you have done to build a friendly community. We will arrange for a replacement as soon as possible, and have them arrive there two weeks before your departure date of late March".

With that out of the way, and with one more-round of community visit to complete before I leave, I decided to organise for them to take place, as soon as the new replacement has arrived, so they can meet the Chagos Islanders personally, before I leave.

I sent an email to Margaret, Jeremy and to Kylie to let them know that I was leaving my job on the Chagos Islands at the end of November, and that I would be heading directly to the Mediterranean to have a well-deserved holiday, for an undecided period.