Telemedia has secured a $38.5 million judgment against government – and the government’s official position is that it will fight the case in Belize’s courts when it comes time to enforce that judgment. That is one tough position, and it means the future holds nothing else but confrontation between Lord Ashcroft and his various business interests and the government of Belize. But, one key Minister, the Minister of Foreign Affairs says that the way to proceed is through negotiation, not confrontation.
Hon. Wilfred Elrington, Minister of Foreign Affairs
“If you were to ask the Prime Minister about me he would be the first one to tell you that Wilfred is a voice of moderation, Wilfred is very moderate, always wants to see the best of a situation. Personally I think that Mr. Ashcroft is one of our biggest investors and if in fact he were to put up his marbles and leave the country, I think we will be in terrible terrible shape. He does not do that and I don’t think he will do that because Belize has also been very good to him. Belize has been exceedingly good to him, largely I think through his own skills at being able to sham the politicians and get what he wants.
But I think the greatest fault lies with the past administration who were so willing and eager to give everything that we had in the country to him so I don’t see him as the demon. I see him as a man who got a better than good deal and I could understand the resentment about him. But I also think he is a man who is very rational. He is not stupid. He is rational, he is intelligent and I believe that if we continue to talk to him, you can in fact come to an accommodation that both of us can live with. I do think though that his personality, I think Mr. Ashcroft loves a fight. He has everything in the world, he doesn’t need anything and so the fight is the kind of thing to my mind that gives him a reason to live, a nice good fight which he feels very confident he is going to win in the end, he gets fun out of that. I think that my own approach to him would be somewhat different. I would tend to be more able to dialogue, debate, discussion.”
Jules Vasquez,
If you are the voice of moderation then you cannot support being a moderate, the hard line taken by the Prime Minister in the official statement last week that it will absolutely not be honoured?
Hon. Wilfred Elrington,
“I am telling you the Prime Minister I find him to be very intelligent and very sensitive and he is a consummate diplomat. Everybody knows that you say one thing in the public but in diplomacy but behind the scenes, the language becomes much softer and much more rational. The Prime Minister doesn’t want to do anything that is going to be inimical to the interests of the Belizean people, that is his primary interest.
Where it is necessary for him to make the final decision, I am sure he is going to do the right thing. I am convinced of that.”
Jules Vasquez,
And the right thing is?
Hon. Wilfred Elrington,
“We have to come to sort of accommodation with Mr. Ashcroft. In my view, you can’t want to go through a mountain with a bulldozer. You have to come to some accommodation.”
Of course, from the public position the PM has taken, we’d have to ask who’s the bulldozer and who’s the mountain? The answer to that should be apparent soon enough.
