UWI Five Islands Campus expansion could begin in January as preferred contractor identified

Plans to expand The University of the West Indies (UWI) Five Islands Campus are advancing at a steady pace, with officials projecting that groundwork on the long-awaited infrastructure upgrade could kick off as early as January, pending final administrative clearances. Announcing the milestone during an appearance on the popular local Browne and Browne broadcast, Antigua and Barbuda’s Minister of Education Daryll Matthew confirmed that the multi-stakeholder oversight committee assigned to oversee the expansion project has wrapped up a full, rigorous review of all submissions received via a formal international tender process. The committee has formally named a preferred bidder for the construction contract, and all relevant documentation has been shared with the project’s international funding and development partners to secure their formal “no objection” sign-off, a required procedural step before the contracting phase can formally launch. Minister Matthew opted not to release the identity of the selected contractor publicly at this stage, noting that the finalization of binding legal agreements is still pending. Prior to narrowing down to the top candidate, the evaluation committee had shortlisted a pool of five to six qualified competing contractors, all of whom met the strict technical, financial and experience benchmarks set for the campus expansion work. Minister Matthew emphasized that the project has already crossed several critical pre-construction milestones, including the finalization of full architectural blueprints, regulatory permitting checks and the completion of the open international tender exercise, marking substantial progress toward breaking ground. While the education ministry is cautiously optimistic about a January construction start date, officials note that the timeline remains contingent on receiving timely clearance from the overseas partner entities and successfully negotiating and finalizing all formal contractual arrangements with the selected preferred contractor.