G.O.B. seeks relief from Miami court ruling

And while the Foreign Affairs Minister was upbeat about the new book, there was no getting around the fact that Belize is mired in a foreign affair that has a federal judge in Miami lashing us mercilessly to the tune of fifty thousand U.S. dollars per day. According to Smith, G.O.B. is not happy with the way things have turned out and is hoping to get out of the contempt ruling with as little pain as possible.

Godfrey Smith
?Certainly it is not a situation we would wish to be in; it is not a useful situation to be in. Specifically in terms of how it affects our relations with the U.S., I would say it doesn?t really have an impact or any great impact. We of course have been utilizing our embassies in the United States, our embassy in Washington. They have been in touch with the State Department in the U.S. explaining the situation. Obviously, Mr. Prosser?s people–I?m sure you?ve the press releases coming out, and they put their own spin on it, making it appear that we have expropriated or have confiscated assets of the company when in fact that?s not the case. In fact the very Miami judgment, speaks to the fact that Belize, the government of Belize is the substantive holder of the shares entitled to it and can dispose of it. But certainly yes, the legal situation with the court in Miami is a situation we?re in we need to extricate ourselves from as quickly as possible.?

Janelle Chanona
?In yesterday?s ruling the judge said that approximately one million US dollars is to be paid. Is the government looking at ways where we can find this money? I know one article said this paves the way for the U.S. government to seize our assets as far as paying the fine??

Godfrey Smith
?We are nowhere yet in terms of paying the fine, as far as I am concerned. I would not be too alarmed or I wouldn?t wish to sound off any alarm bells, because the issue of seizure of assets of the Government of Belize in the United States, in my personal view, is very remote, very unlikely. When we?ve done our research and checks there is no precedent for that kind of thing being done against a foreign country, a foreign state in relation to a case like the one that is underway.?

Janelle Chanona
?But this is also the first time that a government has been found in contempt of a U.S. federal court??

Godfrey Smith
?I am not so sure that is so, our research suggests otherwise. What we have not been able to find is a case or a situation where there has actually been an enforcement of the court contempt order, but it?s a matter we need to be advised on further. As I understand it, the matter has been appealed to a higher court in the United States.?

In related news, the other major player in the B.T.L. drama, Michael Ashcroft’s Ecom, is making some interesting noises. News 5 is reliably informed that two of Ecom’s three B.T.L. directors, Philip Osborne and Dean Boyce, attempted to call a board meeting today but could not do so due to the lack of a quorum. The meeting they tried to hold would have been governed by the ruling of Chief Justice Abdulai Conteh, which declared the makeup of the B.T.L. board to be three directors from Ecom, three from the Belize government and two from Jeffrey Prosser’s Innovative Communications Corporation. But while it has been assumed that Ecom and G.O.B. were working together, the government directors–Gaspar Aguilar, Karen Bevans and Keith Arnold–were all no-shows… presumably on orders from Belmopan. The two Prosser directors, who don’t accept the six-two version of reality, not surprisingly also stayed away. So what’s going on here? Good question. Presumably, the government, already stung by the one point six million dollar contempt fine in Miami, does not wish to further alienate Judge Ungaro-Benages by attending board meetings that she does not recognize. As for Mister Ashcroft, who now owns about twenty-five percent of B.T.L., he’s not a defendant in any U.S. court and has considerably more latitude to engage in what he does best: complex corporate manoeuvres. What Ashcroft and the other two ECOM directors will do about Friday’s four-four teleconference board meeting called by Prosser is anybody’s guess. The early betting is that all eight members will get on the line, every proposed decision will be deadlocked and the gathering will adjourn to continue the fight another day.