Gov’t buys back Silk Cayes for $1.5 million
It’s no secret that over the years ministers of both government have sold off some of the nation’s most valuable land, including cayes, at fire sale prices. And as reprehensible as that practice is, it hurts even more when government winds up buying the property back. Yeah, here we go again.
Janelle Chanona, Reporting
The simple beauty of the Silk or Queen Cayes has lured thousands of visitors to their sparkling shores. But this cluster of islands is once again in the centre of controversy. In June 2000, News 5 revealed that the government had virtually given away the smallest of the Silk Cayes to Belize City businessman Gabby Affif. Government later reacquired the island…but it turns out that the caye was never theirs to sell in the first place. In fact, none of the three islands were crown land at that time. News 5 has confirmed reports that sometime in the early 1980s, believed to be when Florencio Marin was Minister of Natural Resources, the three cayes had already been sold, under the title “Queen Cayes”, to another businessman.
Johnny Briceño, Minister of Natural Resources
“This is a case where damn if you do and damned if you don’t. When this whole issue came up of about the Silk Cayes, when it was sold to Mr. Affif, and it was brought to my attention how important these cayes were, I called in Mr. Affif and I said, he had to bring it back to government; which he did. It was after that fact then it was pointed out to me that a previous government sold all three of them. They were named under the Queen Cayes or the Silk Cayes, and all three had been sold be a previous government. That is when we called in the owner at that time, which is Mr. Zabaneh.”
Eugene Zabaneh, that is. Apparently, the former bus magnate turned airline tycoon, got the cayes as part of a “land swap” arrangement with the Government of Belize…in which Belmopan acquired some land near Dangriga, along with Swallow Caye off Belize City. That trade went smoothly…getting it back wasn’t easy or cheap.
Johnny Briceño
“We went through a long negotiation process. He showed us where he was about to sign a contract with one company for one of the cayes for about one point five million U.S. dollars. And making the point, well it belongs to him. Instead of going through the long acquisition process and going to the courts and probably end up paying more, he finally agreed with government to sell it for one point five million dollars and that’s what happened; now it is in the hands of Belize.”
Janelle Chanona
“Does this speak to the inefficiency at the Lands Department that we don’t even know which cayes are crown land still or which cayes are in the hands of private individuals?”
Johnny Briceño
“We have over a million records in the system right now. And yes, it shows, that is why we have been having so many problems. Presently we are working on a land management project, whereby we are going to put all the lands now into one titling system. Presently we have three different titling systems, and that is why we have so many problems where two or three persons would be getting the same lease. Under the new titling system, under the land registry, we have what we call the registry index map. That will avoid things like this to happen.”
Janelle Chanona
“So now government can assure the people that no other cayes are going to be sold or have been sold recently?”
Johnny Briceño
“No, we’re not selling cayes. What we have been doing, we have been issuing leases to part of cayes because it’s part of the development process. But we go through a long process and we have to ensure that we get the input from the area representative and the lands committees in the area, so that is presently the position of Government.”
And while that position may be an honourable one, the correction of past mistakes continues to be a costly embarrassment. Reporting for News 5, I am Janelle Chanona.
In fairness to government, the one point five million Belize dollar price tag for the three cayes was in fact a bargain. What hurts is that they never should have been privatized in the first place.
