A.G. Vows to Pursue “Vultures” Looking at Foreign Reserves

Michael Peyrefitte

Attorney General Michael Peyrefitte blasted Lord Michael Ashcroft saying that he will ensure that neither Caribbean Investment Holdings Limited nor Belize Social Development Limited gets their hands on the foreign reserves. But as he told reporters following the meeting, the new legislation applies specifically to Belizean companies and individuals – the “vulture funds” that Prime Minister Dean Barrow spoke of on Friday appear to be as immune, for now, as the Central Bank is hoped to be. He also noted that the law itself can be challenged.

Michael Peyrefitte, Attorney General

“There cannot be any criminal sanctions for challenging the law itself; if one wants to make a constitutional application to say that the laws we ratified here today are unconstitutional, then the court would decide that. If you don’t make that challenge, but you attempt to do what the acts criminalize, then you will have to suffer the penalties that the acts articulate in them.”

Reporter

“But how would you attempt to do it?”

Michael Peyrefitte

“Attempt to do what?”

Reporter

“To attach the reserves.”

Michael Peyrefitte

“Who will attempt… well, they will have to decide how they want to do it. Say for example, then, there is a move on the reserves of the Central Bank: a mere attempt to do that, such as the filing of papers; such as a board resolution; such any move by any member of that company or a move by any person who is a Belizean to go after Central Bank assets, then that person commits an offence by the mere attempt to attach the assets. Now the other act is fairly simple: if you go all the way to the C.C.J. and you win a judgment against eh Government of Belize and you attempt to attach Government assets, then that is fine, because you won. But if you’ve lost, and the C.C.J. has said for example that that arbitration or that foreign award is no good because it’s founded on an illegality, and then you still nevertheless try to attach Crown assets after our highest courts have said that your entire agreement was illegal, then that’s just clear mischief, and you want to do something that you are not allowed to do, and the mere attempt to do that is also an offense. British Caribbean Bank [Holdings] is a Belizean company.”

Reporter

“Okay, registered here?”

Michael Peyrefitte

“They are registered in Belize. The only company that is the shadiest of them all is Belize Social Development, but we cannot find any registration for them in Belize as yet; we are told that they are registered somewhere in the B.V.I.; but other than that we cannot find them, so we cannot determine who are the directors, who are the members of that company; and also because there are several agreements that are necessary for them to prove how come arbitration awards were given for them, that we cannot locate and they refuse to turn over. So, that is a challenge; B.S.D.L. will be a challenge because it is not a Belizean company. However, if it contains Belizean directors or Belizean advisors, then we know that we can, for lack of a better term, “attach” them for any actions that they want to take.”