Jeffrey Prosser did not take over the board of BTL at 5:00 pm today and according to the Supreme Court of Belize he cannot, at least not on the authority of a Miami Judge.
That's the judgement of Chief Justice Abdulai Conteh who this afternoon heard an emergency application from Government to block the judgement of Miami Federal Judge Ursula Ungaro Bernages. The Solicitor General Elson Kaseke argued that a judgement made in Florida is not enforceable or effective in Belize. The Chief Justice found that Benages's ruling is not a judgement or an order, and more than that is not a final or conclusive determination. Moreover, the Chief Justice found that, under Belize law, judgement made in the United States do not apply in Belize.
It is a huge relief for the Government of Belize which, by virtue of the ruling, escapes what had appeared to be an imminent Prosser takeover. But by no means is it a save, the situation remains critical for the Government of Belize. But one thing government does have now is the luxury of time to devise a manageable save. And indications are tonight that to extricate themselves from the mess, government is turning to an old friend Michael Ashcroft.
This afternoon at 3:00 pm, freebelize.org posted a document which is a proposed agreement between what appears to be an Ashcroft owned company, named 'Pillow Talk' and the government of Belize to take control of BTL. Under the proposed agreement, Pillow Talk, headed by Ashcroft's former BTL Chairman and current employee Dean Boyce, would team up with government to make up the majority of the_ "c" shares and remove Prosser's four directors. That along with Pillow Talk's purchase of a majority of the "b" shares would give government and Pillow Talk_ control of the company, by leaving them with 6 directors and Prosser with 2. And as a sweetener the agreement also proposes that on the transfer of the shares, some US$14 million, there would be no taxes levied. By our calculations, government would be passing up almost $900,000 in stamp duties alone.
Moreover, the document proposes that the price of the shares would be $5.36 meaning that Pillow Talk would be buying the shares for 10 cents below the current price on each share and that's on 5.5 million shares, meaning that the buyer is getting it for $500,000 less than it was sold for less than a year ago. And what's more Pillow Talk would get a letter from government to be a permitted person, a likely illegal transfer of a right to hold more than 25% of the company that government first gave to Ashcroft in 1993, and then Prosser last year, and now, presumably, one of Ashcroft's companies all over again.
Again, this document is a proposal but we have confirmed with a senior government official that it did not go through this evening and is, "one of very many proposals that the government is fielding."
