Malone said in an interview on ZBVI radio yesterday that his decision to resign from the government roughly six months ago was never about leaving the Virgin Islands Party (VIP) but was more about “getting the information out”.

He said informing the territory on certain matters “would have [gone] against some forms of protocol in the government caucus”.

“There was some areas where it was felt that maybe it shouldn’t have been revealed but I felt that we needed to make sure that the people of the Virgin Islands were well informed,” said Malone who, in the last few weeks and months, have peppered the government with questions about the ongoing constitutional review and the controversial UK Order in Council, among other things.

And when asked what he used to measure the success of his time in the Opposition, Malone said: “Ask any man on the road whether or not they’re better informed as to some of the challenges that we are faced with.”

“They (the public) did not know about certain things, especially … in terms of learning more about the constitution, the constitution review process,” the legislator said.

He continued: “In order to have this constitution review to be deemed a success, we must be able to set a a period for education of the people as to their choices — the one of five, or if there are any more, that come on the table. We must be able to set a date certain for which a referendum could be held. If it is passed, we must be able to set a date where we would either stay as we are if we decide that is what we want to do, go associated state, go integrated, go independent or go republic. These are topics that are more widely talked about because of information [I] imparted.

Timing of Malone’s return

Meanwhile, Malone’s move to rejoin the government comes three days before he contests the chairmanship of the Virgin Islands Party.

When asked whether the move was made to push his political future into becoming Premier of the BVI, Malone said: “It’s not just that, because I always advocate it and I told the people and they know that I remained a member of the Virgin Islands Party. One of the questions that came up was in fact ‘if you were to be victorious in this particular endeavour, would you then cross over?‘ The answer was yes. ‘If your were not victorious, would you then cross back over?‘. The answer is yes. So at the end of the day, whether it’s before of after Sunday’s [VIP internal election] it would happen.”

“The question on Monday would have been, are you now crossing over because you lost or are you now only crossing over because you won? Let’s take that off the table today 2nd February,” Malone added.