My previous attempt (on Wed 16 March 2005) to post the following message from Dr Henry Oakeley has apparently been unsuccessful, so I post it again.
I apologize if it eventually duplicates.
With best wishes to all.
Jean-Marie,
Brussels,
Belgium
From: "Henry Oakeley" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Jean-Marie Vanderwinden" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: WOC
Date: Wed, 16 Mar 2005 01:45:01 -0000
Dear Jean-Marie
If you would like to post this on the OGD website, I would be happy.
"I am glad I enjoy the trust of both Andy Easton and my colleagues on the WOC Trust. I have respect for them all - Andy's knowledge on matters orchidaceous and his generosity in helping others with information is legendary. But, whoever told Andy that the voting for the site of the 20th WOC was 11-5 for South Africa was misinformed. I and the other Trustees were the only persons who saw the voting papers so whoever told this to my friend Andy was fabricating the numbers (and I suspect being mischievous at that - 'stirring it' is the English _expression_). Singapore put on a stunning presentation of their case to hold the WOC in 2011 and won. It had all the qualities required of a WOC, from the involvement of orchid societies to promoting orchids in the community, providing a stupendous multinational show within a 4 acre air-conditioned glasshouse in a new botanic garden in central Singapore - and much more. Their presentation won for the Selection Committee. South Africa and Taiwan both produced solid, well constructed cases for their bid for the 2011 WOC, but did not receive the majority of the votes. If they had, they would have been holding the 2011 WOC.
As far as resigning goes, both Donna Clarke and I had planned to resign from the World Orchid Conference Trust, well before the Conference in order that younger persons might become Trustees and gain the necessary experience to help organisers of future WOCs. We both did so (not just myself). The RHS and the AOS (being the largest horticultural society and orchid society in the world, respectively, and founders of the WOC Trust) will each appoint a Trustee in due course, in accordance with the legally constituted Trust deeds. I have found the attacks on the Trustees personally distressing, but as Andy indicates, as a Psychiatrist in an earlier stage in my life, I expect I can find them interesting, which helps.
The WOC in Dijon produced a stunning show with the best landscaping of any show I have ever been to, with stupendous waterfalls, false mountains, real cycads and palms, bamboos etc as landscaping, fountains and mood lighting with tapes of forest birds and howler monkeys to give atmosphere. Sales in the orchid booths were very successful, the Show was packed for up to 14 hours a day, and one UK exhibitor sold out their entire stock in four days. Despite the difficulties with CITES (one exhibitor had to withdraw because the US Government was taking 3-5 months to process CITES applications to Europe - Singapore takes less than a week, incidentally), the inclement weather, and a half-hearted train strike which did not disrupt my train journey to Dijon at all, it has been a successful Show. There were 'niggles', but these are easier to point out than to lay credit and praise where it is due. I could list every complaint I heard (in the same way as you will be able to list any and all of my typos, errors in grammar, punctuation etc. but not the words which are correct), but even the French taxi drivers sang the praises of the Show (and sometimes in their best English!). What more could one want?
Peter O'Byrne rightly summarises the care that is taken of Trustees visiting sites to ensure they have undertaken 'due diligence' to discharge their legal duties of care in assessing sites for future WOCs. I have received hospitality (including travel and accommodation expenses and meals) from members of the Orchid Society of South East Asia in Singapore, members of the South African Orchid Society, and members of the Taiwan Orchid Growers Association (and their respective governmental agencies) during my assessments of their shows and conferences, preparatory to their WOC bids. I and the other Trustees are grateful to all of them equally for their sponsorship and kindness. The tenure of a Trusteeship should not be only for those who could afford to perform the Trust's duties on their own bank balances.
It has been suggested that Andy Easton was implying that the Trustees had taken bribes (of some sort or another) but he kindly rang me at considerable length to assure me that this was not the case, and while he may have likes and dislikes at a personal level for members of the Trust, he assured me that he does not accuse any of us of receiving bribes. I am allowed to disagree with him (as friends may, without injuring that friendship) as I do not find that 'the orchid world has lost respect for the WOC concept and those who administer it' - on the contrary, the warm applause for Joyce Stewart (President of the WOC Trustees) at the Dijon WOC when she was acting as Chairman at several meetings emphasises the trust and appreciation that she enjoys in the orchid world. The premise that the WOC Trustees have 'broken the rules' is based on incorrect information supplied to Andy. The premise that the Trustees are inappropriate in their visiting sites proposed for future WOCs is not correct - it is their duty. The premise that the Trustees have taken bribes is not one that Andy believes - he assures me. The premise that the voting was 11-5 in favour of South Africa for the 2011 WOC is also a mischievous piece of misinformation, which I am sure Andy will accept from me. Similarly the report to him that the Trustees had a 'hastily convened meeting in secret session' is wonderfully emotive and denigratory phraseology that has been given to him for reasons that escape me (except a desire to be mischievous); the Site Selection committee always meets in private, as does the Trust - and far from being 'hastily convened' it is written into the WOC timetable for each WOC (see Dijon programme in this instance). One also only has to look at the programme, rather than believe fabrications, to see that the meeting was on Monday 14th March, not Saturday 12th March as Andy's informant is quoted. The informant cannot even be truthful about the date and is lying to Andy to pursue a personal vendetta against one at least of the Trustees. This is not an honourable way to behave, and the informant should come out publicly and state who he/she is and his/her motives in supplying the mis-information for this correspondence.
We are all looking forward to the next WOC in Miami, USA. Let us all support it constructively and enjoy it. Andy is well known for being the Education Director of the American Orchid Society and living in Miami - a 'google' on his name on the web brings this up again and again. He left the AOS post a year or two ago, but his letters to the Orchid Guide Digest website regarding Dijon, the WOC Trustees etc., copied to Lee Cooke his former boss in the AOS, have been thought to represent the views of the American Orchid Society or even those of the Miami WOC Board. The President of the AOS assures me that Andy's views are not those of the AOS, but I will leave it to him to state the views of the AOS on these matters if he wishes to. Robert Fuchs, of the South Florida Orchid Society, speaking on behalf of the 19th WOC in Miami, praised the 18th WOC in Dijon in his closing address. In much the same way I hope that we will all praise the Miami WOC when it closes, for being a great success - as we expect it to be.
On a totally uncontentious note I would like to remind you that the European Orchid Conference in Padua, Italy, is in February 2006; sometimes it is quite warm then, sometimes it is ankle deep (6 inches or 15 cms for those of you who like more formal measurements) in snow but it will coincide with the Venice Carnival (half an hour away) and another huge flower show, and should be fun for all. I hope that it will be a week before the Japan Grand Prix International Orchid Show in Tokyo, Japan where it also sometimes snows and is sometimes sunny.
Regards to all,
Henry Oakeley
Retired Trustee of the World Orchid Conference Trust"
Brussels, Belgium.
mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://users.skynet.be/jmv9874/
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