Lord Michael Ashcroft Reacts to C.C.J. Decision

The C.C.J. on Tuesday delivered a severe decision against the government using language like abuse of power, high-handed, and inconsistent with good governance. . The judgment handed down is in respect of an appeal filed by Belize Investment Services Limited, the former parent company of IMMARBE and IBC registries is a scathing indictment of the manner in which the Government unlawfully acquired assets belonging to a company partly by Lord Michael Ashcroft.  The written decision which was made public immediately following the teleconference from the C.C.J.’s seat in Trinidad, involves terse language describing government’s autocratic approach in respect of B.I.S.L.  The quantum of damages will now be calculated and determined by the Supreme Court of Belize, but earlier today Lord Michael Ashcroft was candid in a one-on-one interview with News Five.  Touching on a number of issues relating to the judgment, Ashcroft gave an initial reaction to the decision, pointing out that government has set a dangerous precedence of failing to comply with the ruling of its highest court.

Michael Ashcroft

Lord Michael Ashcroft

“First of all, it is important to understand that the ownership of B.I.S.L. is a fifty-fifty joint venture and fifty percent is owned by the Panama law firm of Morgan & Morgan and the other fifty percent is controlled by a company of mine.  So indirectly, my interest is about forty-five percent of B.I.S.L.  So it’s not a hundred percent Ashcroft company here, but this has been a long journey remembering that in 2013 the government just walked into the registry and physically took possession of it in breach of the extension agreement.  They did not seek to go to court to say that the extension was either unlawful, illegal or whatever reason that they gave.  So after seven years the Caribbean Court of Justice has said that the Government of Belize acted unlawfully, improperly and should have sought a more amicable statement.  So obviously B.I.S.L. has been vindicated at the C.C.J., but of course this is only a stepping stone.  The C.C.J. has said that B.I.S.L. is entitled to damages and that those damages in the lower courts were assessed by government’s expert at being twenty-four million U.S. dollars and by B.I.S.L.’s experts at forty-three or forty-four million dollars.  Somewhere between those two figures will be the ultimate amount of damages and then we’ve already heard from the attorney general that their intention after that would be to put to the House and go through the same charade that we have gone through with Universal Health Service with the so-called vote of confidence which is fascinating for international investors who will see for the second time if that happens that Belize as a nation does not comply with the orders of their top court, the Caribbean Court of Justice.”