Another highly technical matter confronting the government is a case that's coming to court next month. In September, the Ashcroft Alliance and government are going to court to argue about the enforcement of the arbitral award for the Universal Healthcare Loan. Remember that one? It's the government guarantee to the Belize Bank for the private hospital which was given during the Musa administration. When the private owners couldn't pay, government had to - and they did! Still, they never got back the asset and the creditor sold the hospital to Belize Healthcare Partners.
But government is still on the hook - which was upheld in international arbitration! And the matter is going to court now for local enforcement. But because of the circumstances, the Prime Minister believes it does not have much prospect for success:..
Prime Minister Dean Barrow
"I don't see how here can be enforcement in the particular circumstances. What I am talking about? Clearly 40 million dollars was paid to the Belize Bank and that cleared off the UHS indebtedness; the Indebtedness of government as guarantor for the UHS loan. A problem arose later on when 20 million of the 40 was called back. But before that took place there was the sale of the hospital after the indebtedness was cleared off. Why on earth did the asset which was collateral for the indebtedness revert to government and when it was sold how come government received not a penny? Is there some sort of double dipping/double collection on the part of the bank? If you look at the first partial award made by the tribunal, you will see that they found as a fact that the Belize Bank collected 39 million dollars by way of that sale of the asset. If that is a fact, and we know that they had earlier collected 40 million dollars, how come you on the face of it end up with 79 million dollars for a 40 million dollar debt?"
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