GOB?s inclination to lean over backwards for Lord Michael appeared in a different area of the Belizean financial scene late last week. Lord Ashcroft owns 20 per cent of Ports of Belize Limited (PBL), the local partners of Carnival Cruise Line, which wants to invest $US50 million in a new cruise ship dock/tourist village/amusement park on the Port Loyola coastline. Lord Michael also provided most of the investment capital for Ports of Belize?s leading shareholder, Luke Espat, and Ashcroft?s stake in PBL (and the Carnival deal) is therefore greater than his personal shares. So eager was GOB to please the Lord so he can, presumably, bail them out of the Prosser/IBM mess, or, at the very least, offer GOB an option to disaster, that they used their party newspaper organ, THE BELIZE TIMES, on Thursday last week to read the riot act to Tourism Minister, Hon. Mark Espat, who, on behalf of other stakeholders in the local tourism industry and the people of Belize, was balking at certain clauses in the original Carnival contract signed by Prime Minister, Hon. Said Musa, in April this year. The Tourism Minister signed the ?Clarification Agreement? to the Carnival contract the following day, Friday, November 12, in Belmopan.
Ports of Belize, other sources say, needs to acquire various pieces of land which poor Belizeans are presently occupying. These lands are in the Port Loyola area. Readers will remember that some months ago a full page spread appeared in the Opposition UDP newspaper, THE GUARDIAN, featuring extraordinary pictures of the billionaire Lord visiting poverty-stricken areas of Port Loyola and ?greeting? the relevant residents.
If our sources are correct, it appears that the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.