When we contacted him today, Aguilar also declined to comment on the matter, saying that he is seeking legal advice.
Aguilar had recently exposed the manner in which BTL was being handled under the tenure of Michael Ashcroft and his executive committee up to early 2004, through sworn affidavits in the Belize Supreme Court. According to Aguilar, Ashcroft?s Carlisle Holdings collected over $10 million in management fees from BTL between 2001 and 2004, and tied up $30 million of BTL?s money in the Belize Bank between 2003 and 2006.
He also stated that ?After the Carlisle Group took over in December 2000, major projects and decisions were determined and made largely in secrecy by the executive committee.?
The new board of directors of BTL is today issuing notices to its shareholders for its Annual General Meeting, slated for Friday, September 30, 2005. The meeting would call together over 1,000 shareholders, amid rumors that $6 million of BTL?s money is missing.
While BTL?s chairman, Keith Arnold, did not address the matter of the $6-million rumor specifically when we spoke with him today, he did say, ?Whatever rumors that you hear, comments will be made in audited financial statements.?
Arnold told us that executive committees and audit committees have traditionally run BTL, even under the tenure of Jeffrey Prosser. He said that BTL?s newly appointed executive committee is currently busy preparing financial statements, the directors? reports, and other documents to issue to shareholders.
The financial reports will span Prosser?s term, before Aguilar assumed the post of CEO. The reports are expected to reveal how Prosser and his directors managed BTL during their tenure.
Just before the start of the last financial year, April 2004, BTL changed hands from Michael Ashcroft?s Carlisle Holdings to Jeffrey Prosser?s ICC. Then this February, GOB took over the company from Prosser. Today, a coalition board, with three seats held by GOB and 3 seats held by Ashcroft, runs BTL.
Last Monday, an executive committee, which the board had set up, took control of the company?s management and Aguilar was returned to his former post of Chief Financial Officer.
BTL?s auditor is Pannell Kerr Foster, Chartered Accountants.
Recently, George Swift of Swift and Associates was appointed under a statutory instrument to do an inspection of BTL. Swift met last week with BTL?s new board.
Formerly, BTL had 8 directors, two of them for the holder of the Special Share. However, in early August, the National Assembly passed new legislation giving the Minister of Public Utilities, Hon. Ralph Fonseca, power to cancel those two seats, which he did almost two weeks ago.
BTL?s current directors are Keith Arnold (chairman); Rocky Reef Ventures (company secretary); Shire Holdings Limited; Seascape Holdings Limited; Ediberto Tesucum; and Philip Zuniga.
Arnold, Tesucum and Zuniga sit on the board for GOB, while the remaining 3 seats are for Ashcroft/Carlisle.
Carlisle?s ECOM has pledged to purchase another 12% of BTL?s shares, which would likely give it another seat on the board.
We asked Arnold whether BTL?s new board had considered and passed a resolution on the sale of shares in BTL to ECOM, another Ashcroft-related company, and the Belizean public. He said that the matter had been given ?some consideration,? but declined to specify which resolutions had been passed.