By AVA TURNQUEST
and NEIL HARTNELL
SENATE President Sharon Wilson yesterday “categorically” denied that her law firm was employed by the government as registration documents revealing the identities of the 13 ‘bad’ borrowers who sank the Bank of the Bahamas (BOB) and caused its $100m taxpayer “bail out” emerged.
Mrs Wilson rebutted suggestions that her company, Sharon Wilson & Co, represented the government in the mortgage debt transfer between BOB and Bahamas Resolve Ltd, a newly-created government-owned entity, and that she had not publicly disclosed the company’s alleged involvement which might have constituted a conflict of interest.
“I can categorically deny that. We are not retained or employed by the government,” she told The Tribune. “I’m not familiar with this matter, and will have to look into it, but we are not employed by the government.”
The government, the majority shareholder in BOB, last year unveiled the plans to strengthen the bank through the creation of Bahamas Resolve, which has taken over $100 million in troubled loan assets.
The Resolve transaction saw BOB exchange a net $45.4 million worth of “bad” commercial loans with the government-owned Bahamas Resolve vehicle in exchange for $100 million worth of promissory notes (government bonds). The benefits from that deal, which allowed BOB to “write back” $54.6 million in provisions and accrued interest, are already being eradicated by its continued losses.
Documents lodged with the Registrar General’s Department by Bahamas Resolve, the entity to which these “toxic” loans were transferred, reveal that despite the “bad” loan portfolio being transferred to Bahamas Resolve on October 30 last year, it took almost eight months to properly record the transaction by lodging the documents at the Registrar General’s Department.
Deloitte & Touche (Bahamas), the accounting firm charged with collecting on the “bad” commercial loans formerly belonging to BOB, did this on June 26, 2015, with the associated Stamp Tax due to the Public Treasury paid two days earlier. The law firm that handled the transfer was Sharon Wilson & Co.
The documents – a copy of which has been obtained by The Tribune – also reveal the delinquent borrowers as Philip Lightbourne, Premium Food Services and H&B Investments; Kingsley Enoch Edgecombe Jr and his wife, Cheryl Jane Edgecombe; Dr Donald Leon Cooper and his company, DLC Investments; John H Bain and Idena C Bain, and their company, Bain Investments and Development; Kendal Robert Williams and Kendal Williams Construction Company; Franklyn Morley and Longside Investments Ltd; North Andros Food Services Ltd and Jerome Rofeno Forbes; Campbell’s Electric Company and Stanley Gustavious Campbell; Lock Resorts ltd, Datavu Ltd (guarantor), Brenda Carolyn Lockhart and Laverne Rudolph; Philip Lundy and East Street Investment Company; Landstar Concrete Products; Malv Investments, Sea-Ban Products (Bahamas) Ltd, and Ruiz Edmund Munnings and Ingrid Munnings; and Anthony Erasto Albury and Anthony Edward Albury.
FULL STORY, SEE BUSINESS
Comments
DillyTree 8 years, 7 months ago
Most if not of the "bad" borrowers on this list can well afford to pay their debts. The question is why they have not been made to do so. Most have assets that can be seized and sold to collect some of the debt. Why isn't our government doing more to collect these so-called bad debts? Why should the Bahamian taxpayers have to pay instead?
To those who owe these debts, there's only one message for you -- PAY UP you shameless losers!
sheeprunner12 8 years, 7 months ago
I sure hope that Damian Gomez is preparing his papers for filing ........... that the good Senate President should resign immediately ................ BOL
DillyTree 8 years, 7 months ago
Yep, High Sheriff Damien should be filing this one soon. Do these people not understand what "conflict of interest" means?
asiseeit 8 years, 7 months ago
They think they slick. Someone hired her law firm, probably BOB, which would make her statement true. It's all in the wording, these lawyers are disgusting like that. You reporters need to step up your game.
iamcitizen 8 years, 7 months ago
Senator Sharon Wilson says "We are not retained or employed by the government,…….I’m not familiar with this matter, and will have to look into it, but we are not employed by the government.”
This response lacks credibility when one considers the following: (1) Bahamas Resolve is wholly owned by the Bahamas Government; (2) The Bahamas Government is BOB's majority shareholder and (3) The Senator's law firm SHARON WILSON & CO.'s stamp appears on the cover sheets of two separate Bank of The Bahamas to Bahamas Resolve Limited documents: A Transfer Of Mortgages document dated October 30th, 2014 and an Affidavit Of Loss Of Transfer Of Mortgages dated June 10th, 2015.
Both documents were lodged for record with the Registrar General on June 26th 2015. Yet she insists "’m not familiar with this matter, and will have to look into it, but we are not employed by the government.” WOW! I suppose when she is next questioned on this matter she will claim to have been engaged by DELOITTE & TOUCHE her husband's former accounting firm or she might take a page out of the Attorney General's playbook and claim this matter was handled by her daughter who is an Associate / Partner of Sharon Wilson & Co. law firm.
No matter how this is sliced and diced by Senator Wilson, her firm was engaged / retained to provide legal services for two government - owned entities as was Deloitte and Touche.
by iamcitizen
sheeprunner12 8 years, 7 months ago
She is just another lying tieffin PLP .. ....like her slimeball husband (Snake)
jackbnimble 8 years, 7 months ago
By the way, the signature in the margin of the document is an associate's at her firm. S. Munroe works for her.
DonAnthony 8 years, 7 months ago
Come on people are you going to believe the the honorable Sharon Wilson or your lying eyes? Wake up Bahamas. We are not free, we are ruled by a cadre of lying, corrupt elites. These people have no shame or honesty. God help us!
TalRussell 8 years, 7 months ago
Comrades, it's so dangerous to a popularly elected government's mandate to be preparing to face voters come the 2017 General, when your administration have have become so resolved in the art of taking opportunities away from thousands Peter's to hand them over to the few Paul's.
Particularly so, if the Paul's can be shown be among the political favoured.
Believe me Rt. Honourable PM, there can be no worser an enemy than thousands vindictive voters when you hand them something they can wrap their heads around and it sticks likes crazy glue up in they brain cells.
Maybe, Baha Ma's financial complexities -excluding that 'dock' - are not so simple for common folks wraps they heads around.
But believes me - these Paul's, sure as hell ARE goin be stick-able, the second you rungs 2017 bell.
The_Oracle 8 years, 7 months ago
What is with the friggin Dock Tal? Tell us the story man!
MonkeeDoo 8 years, 7 months ago
The corruption in this country is RIFE !!! She must be charged and the profits forfeit.
MonkeeDoo 8 years, 7 months ago
I heard that Tal got the contract to build the dock but hasn't been paid yet. That's what all the fuss is about.
kaytaz 8 years, 7 months ago
I am so sick and tired of these politicians its amazing the things they do......she will claim she was not aware her company had tbe contract.lying and stealing thier way to the top...all for me baby...p l p
BahamaPundit 8 years, 7 months ago
The one thing I've learned from Bahamian politicians is,"deny, deny, deny," no matter if it's true or false, so long as you're not in front of a Judge or swearing an affidavit, "deny, deny, deny." What a great example for our youth. What a great example of people who care nothing for the Bahamian people but only for themselves.
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