Takeover of registries will cause multimillion dollar litigation

Dean Barrow

Government assumed control of the registries on Tuesday morning; and there will be much discussion and yes, expensive litigation ahead. B.I.S.L. is confident that it holds a valid agreement and government has breached that contract. In a release issued on Tuesday that company claims that it will, “vigorously defend its contractual rights and pursue its claim for damages to the highest level of the legal system in Belize and will exercise all options available to it to vindicate its rights.” The fact is that millions of taxpayer dollars has been paid to select attorneys in litigation arising from moves by government, so we had to ask the question to the Prime Minister.

Mike Rudon

“I remember right after B.T.L. was taken over, I believe it was in the house and you were saying I can assure you all that there will not be endless litigation in this matter… and we have seen where that has turned up. Are we looking forward to another round of litigations where only the attorneys get rich in the matter?”

Prime Minister Dean Barrow

“I won’t comment on the last part—whether the attorneys get rich or not. I am telling you that this government is prepared to defend to the death—if you would forgive me a little bit of hyperbole—our actions which are the only actions any right-minded government that is true to its compact to serve the national interest of the country; the only actions any such government can take. I read for you from the E.U. commission decision. You go talk to the people in the aquaculture industry and see if they won’t tell you that this is a day that has been too long postponed…that now they can breathe easily because they know their exports to the European Union have been preserved. So we have no apologies to make, in fact, we will trumpet this as a positive move on the part of the government consistent with our well-known stance that we will do whatever it takes to protect the well-being of Belize including the economic well-being of Belize.”