Godfrey answers Opposition charges on D.F.C.
The Thursday morning ritual of thumbing through the local papers was a little more interesting than usual today…given the dramatic headline of Millions from DFC for a favoured few in the Guardian newspaper. The front page article of the Opposition weekly lists several companies, who reportedly borrowed significant sums of money from the Development Finance Corporation simply on the basis of their political affiliation. Hit with the double whammy was former P.U.P. minister Glenn Godfrey, whose companies allegedly not only received multimillion dollar loans, but it so happened that he was also chairman of the same Development Finance Corporation. This afternoon, Godfrey, who heads two of the companies named: Intelco and Western Caribbean Properties, flatly denied the allegations.
Glenn Godfrey, Chairman, Intelco
“In fact the loans were not from D.F.C., neither of the companies has ever received a loan from D.F.C. I don’t have a loan from the D.F.C. I had one loan way back from D.F.C., which I paid off already. The loans were from St. James. I don’t know if they are confused in some way, if it is deliberate malice or whatever. I’m very disappointed that they didn’t check with me so that I could explain it, because the explanation is very simple and straightforward. It’s just not a D.F.C. loan.”
Janelle Chanona
“As your former position as chairman of D.F.C., what would you say to the broad based allegation that D.F.C. was there to serve people who were avid P.U.P. supporters?”
Glenn Godfrey
“That’s not true.”
Janelle Chanona
“Not these specific people, but anybody who…maybe another article comes out and other information and other documents…”
Glenn Godfrey
“I never checked to see what party it belonged to. In fact, I’m not even on the credit committee; I was never on the credit committee. The decisions about loans for the most part were made by the credit committee, and certainly I don’t know of any time where anybody suggested that this person should or should not get a loan depending on the party affiliation.”
Janelle Chanona
“So if it did happen it just kind of happened that way?”
Glenn Godfrey
“Certainly, I am not aware of it happening.”
Janelle Chanona
“When looking at the Novelo’s corporation, on the face of it, it appears they got all of this money just to buy out their competitors?”
Glenn Godfrey
“I really don’t want to discuss anybody else’s business except my own.”
Janelle Chanona
“But as Chairman of the D.F.C…”
Glenn Godfrey
“Well I can’t discuss my former position. A banker owes confidence to his…”
Janelle Chanona
“But doesn’t it speak to the kinds of loans that D.F.C. supports? The kind of businesses? Wouldn’t that have been a more commercial loan as opposed to a D.F.C. loan?”
Glenn Godfrey
“D.F.C. can make any type of loan it wants. Basically if it is a good loan it’s a good loan, D.F.C. doesn’t charge any less than the commercial banks.”
But given Glenn Godfrey’s intense involvement in the Belizean banking industry via Provident Bank and the Alliance Bank, the issue of conflict of interest did become factor for the businessman.
Glenn Godfrey
“Whenever you’re in business in a small country like Belize there will inevitably be conflicts. And the D.F.C. and the law generally provides that when there’s a conflict of interest you do not take part in the decision making. And if you look at it, you will see that on every occasion in which anything arose that involved me, I stepped back and I had other members of the board handle it.”
Janelle Chanona
“So as a chairman you never voted on who got loans?”
Glenn Godfrey
“No. Involving me? No you can’t do that, you’re obligated by law to step out of the room and not be involved in that decision.”
Janelle Chanona
“Was that a contributing factor to why you resigned as chairman?”
Glen Godfrey
“It was, yes. I felt that, well I’m going to get very busy, I was recently appointed honorary counsel to Finland, and I wanted to devote my time more time to Intelco. But there was also these allegations spreading out, and I said rather than stay there and cause complications for whoever might have appointed me, it will be better I just step out and ask for somebody to do it. It’s a very exhausting job, you do a lot of work and it’s barely remunerated.”
Glenn Godfrey resigned as Chairman of the Development Finance Corporation just over a month ago. According to Godfrey, the Prime Minister has yet to appoint a replacement for the position.
