"You are an enemy of the State - no white woman can be allowed to own such property!" screamed Senator Asot Michael, Antigua’s former Junior Finance Minister in the face of Mrs Natalia Querard, Managing Director of HMB holdings Limited.
Echoing Zimbabwe’s despot dictator, Robert Mugabe, Michael was referring to his Government’s attempt at forced seizure of Half Moon Bay Resort, the privately owned property of US citizens, effectively in the name of the British Crown and in breach of US trade agreements.
Exercising eminent domain allows the State to compulsory acquire private property to enable it to be used for public purpose, such as roads, reservoirs or runways.
Specifically, it does not permit property to be passed to other private persons or organisations and former owners must be compensated in the amount of full market value of their property.
Half Moon Bay Hotel was the first hotel built in Antigua. Its 108-acre estate includes the existing 100-room hotel, a 9-hole private golf course (one of the few hotels in the Caribbean to have its own) and other land earmarked for further expansion, estate homes and villas.
Former Prime Minister Lester Bird claimed that he was acquiring the property for public use and for the benefit of the neighbouring communities. However, this thinly veiled land grab was exposed by Bird himself in Parliament, when he first suggested that the Government’s sale of the Half Moon Bay property would balance the budget deficit and, subsequently, proudly announced the names of prospective private buyers.
As recorded on his Government’s website, his concluding remarks at the debate in Parliament of the 2003 Budget on 11 April 2003 included the following paragraph under the section – Selling Half Moon Bay: "To do so, it was always necessary that we should sell the property to a serious investor with the proven resources to develop a high quality property. I am pleased to say that we now have three such potential investors: Saul Kerzner of South Africa's famous Sun City and Atlantis at Paradise Island in The Bahamas, Mr William B Johnson founder of Ritz Carlton Hotels, and Mr R Allen Stanford, whose investments here are already well known." British entrepreneur, Peter De Savary has also been linked to the affair.
The owners of the Half Moon Bay property filed for and were granted a Judicial Review of the attempted expropriation, which arrested the process of acquisition and prevented it from becoming final.
However, the Government has successfully blocked the actual hearing of the case for years, in the expectation that the financial, physical and emotional burden of the circumstances would ultimately wear the owners down into giving up the fight.
Electricity and water, controlled by the Government on Antigua, have been cut to the property and to the residence of the Managing Director. Telephones are monitored, mail opened, and character assassination in print and on the air have become regular fare.
Elsewhere in the Caribbean and South America, the dangerous lead by the Antigua & Barbuda Government is being closely watched. The Daily Herald repeated statements made by St. Maarten Minister of Tourism Theo Heyliger in its article: "Theo: Government 'looking' at Antigua expropriation example for Mullet Bay".
Prior to the elections in March 2004, the Bird dynasty dominated Antiguan politics for nearly forty years. Its debt-ridden regime achieved one of the highest per capita shortfalls of any country in the world. Transparency and accountability in public sector economic management did not exist.
Government spending had not been independently audited since 1983. In 2004, the IMF reported debts to foreign lenders had spiralled from $60 million in 1994 to at least $2billion. This did not include the massive sums owned to local investors, such as Stanford interests, which amongst other ventures control the airport, the Antigua Sun newspaper and the two largest banks on the Island.
R Allen Stanford, sole shareholder, Chairman & CEO of the Texas-based Stanford International Financial Group, which includes a coin & bullion operation, claims to handle a portfolio of US $25 billion for over 40,000 clients in 80 countries, across six continents, employing 1500 people in USA, Switzerland, Mexico, Venezuela, Ecuador, Panama, Antigua and several other Caribbean nations, including Aruba.
It conducts its business through broker Bear, Stearns Securities, Corp and does not have a US banking licence.
As Leader of the Opposition, Baldwin Spencer supported the owners of the Half Moon Bay Resort in their struggle to protect their property against what he too perceived to be an improper and ill-advised land grab by the former regime.
During the months prior to the last election, he and his United Progressive Party campaigned on the promise of righting wrongs inflicted by their predecessor. Once elected to the office of Prime Minister, Baldwin Spencer specifically promised the reversal of the acquisition process, in proper steps to be taken in and out of Parliament.
This promise was repeated, in diplomatic and private meetings and in Cabinet.
Sadly, after fourteen months of rule, nothing has changed. The legal action is suspended. Power is still not restored to the property, although the Public Utilities Company is now in breach of a Court Order to do so. The Attorney General, who in his private practice preceding his elevation to Ministerial status had opposed the Half Moon Bay Company in several legal matters, continues to block the Prime Minister’s intentions, by setting conditions and proposing procedures, which cannot be accepted by the owners – or indeed by any reasonable entity.
The latest proposal by AG Justin Simon, a formidable proponent of the proposed Caribbean Court of Justice, is for the owners to withdraw their legal impediment to allow the completion of the process of forced acquisition by the Government and voluntarily transfer title of their property to the Government.
The Government would then transfer that title back to the owners, provided the owners agree to a full indemnification for an unspecified body of individuals connected to the expropriation for actions past or still to be discovered. The puerility of these proposals should not obscure the nature of their substance.
Completion of the forced acquisition process would make Antigua & Barbuda guilty of illegal expropriation and the country would have committed a cardinal sin of democracy. "Handing back" the property would not excuse its action. It would still be an illegal action, made all the more damaging by being taken in the name of the Crown and one which sets a dangerous precedent for the country and the region.
Furthermore, indications that personal animus continues to drive the rule of law in Antigua, even in the face of specific and direct instructions from its Prime Minister, are not encouraging signals for a new Administration to send out in connection with foreign direct investments in its country. It is not a condition that would instil serious, legitimate international investors with confidence in either the investment climate or the legal system, especially in view of the proposed Caribbean Court of Justice.
Meanwhile, with four years still to go before the next election, Bird’s Antigua Labour Party grows stronger by the day. Former Minister of Tourism, Molwyn Joseph now Chairman of the ALP, rabble-rouses to exhort a mob to march on Half Moon Bay in an attempt to coerce the Government to "get on with taking the property for the people of Antigua".
Confusion is encouraged, lies, slander and libel reign supreme among the arsenal of dirty tricks, which have always been the mainstay of the previous Administration.
Indeed, few could relish the prospect of a return to the corrupt, debt-ridden malgovernance of a Bird-led regime, whose policies would continue to encourage trans-national criminals and terrorists.
Where does that leave Antigua & Barbuda? The new Government sounds better than the old. The new Prime Minister appears to be a man of principle. There is no indication, however, that he can make his Government follow his vision. With so much yet to do and so little done to bring his vision into reality, time is not on his side.
Until, Antigua & Barbuda makes a forceful and meaningful demonstration that it has adopted the good practise expected by the international community, legitimate foreign direct investment cannot reach its beautiful shores.
Meanwhile, investigations continue to determine if the Bill confirming the intention to expropriation Half Moon Bay resort received Royal Assent in the proper manner.
As a former British colony, Antigua & Barbuda retains Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II as its Head of State. A limited class of Bills must be reserved for Queen’s pleasure by the Governor-General and, normally, these refer to constitutional matters.
A potential serious breach of Chapter II, the Fundamental Rights and Freedoms of the Individual to the Protection From Deprivation of Property of The Constitution of Antigua & Barbuda, would seem to have required such action.
Other enquiries into reports that contracts were signed by representatives of the previous Administration and even that money changed hands to consummate agreements are also ongoing.
The combination of lucrative official finder-fees and the prospect of having to return monies boldly taken in anticipation of a successful sequestration could well be strengthening the invisible, underlying reluctance to hand back the property to its rightful owners promptly.
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