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Digging Deeper Into Vega Family Flipping Scheme
posted (December 13, 2016)
And, as she leaves, the latest breaking land scandal is the one with those 1600 acres of farmland in Carmelita village. PUP Shadow Minister for Natural Resources Cordel Hyde revealed a scheme at Friday's house meeting where 50 regular people got title for adjoining properties in the area and almost immediately flipped it to Vega family members.

Last night, we were showing you but a few of those transactions which ended with both German and Marilene Vega owning the land, but tonight we show you a few of them which ended up with other members of Vega.

Set 20
Here in this document, you'll see that instead of the land being sold to someone and then to the Vega family, the Lands Department immediately sold a piece of land in Carmelta Village to Ignacio Vega Sr. for just over 11,600 dollars.

Set 21
In this one, you see that the Ministry of Natural Resources approved the transfer of another piece of land in Carmelita to Karen S. Vega.

But, then, as we inspect further, we notice something very strange. The documents for some reason don't add up. For all the others for German Vega's company series, it starts out with someone else buying the land first, and then selling it to German Vega and Sons Import Limited a short time after. But later on the person in the middle appears to sell the land to German Vega's company before they bought it from the Lands Ministry!

Set 31
Take for example this one. The Natural Resources Ministry approves Marco Antonio Miranda to buy a piece of land in Carmelita on September 2, 2013. He pays just under $2,500 for the transfer.

Set 31a
Then in this document, it says that Marco Antonio Miranda sold the land to German Vega's company on August 27, 2013, 5 days before he bought the land! So, how it that he could sell something he doesn't have? Nevertheless, he collects $15,000 for it

Set 32
The same thing happened in this transaction for Rosalyn Cruz. The document says that also on September 2, 2013, the Ministry allowed her to buy a piece of land in Carmelita. Then in this one, it says that she sold it to German Vega's company on August 27, 2013, 5 days before she was allowed to buy it. Again, she collects $15,000.

We've seen at least 2 other persons with the same discrepancy, and so today, the asked Retreage and the Prime Minister about the discrepancies. She said she only became aware of the suspect scheme when Cordel Hyde revealed it last week:

Hon. Vanessa Retreage, Departing Min. of Natural Resources
"When I heard the presentation by Mr. Hyde in the house, of course it caused concern for me. It is an issue that I would not have looked at had it not been brought to my attention and still it has only been brought to my attention as I have seen the pictures and the documents but that concerned public officers in the Ministry of Natural Resources, was not so concerned to bring it to my attention so that I could address it. So I wonder what was the mischief trying to be created because nobody brought it officially to my attention. I had only been privy to what has been said in the media and I have not seen the documents at all in relation to what was referred to."

Mike Rudon, BZ Times
"There are about 55 different documents in which the then Minister of Natural Resources, Gaspar Vega, transferred lands in a specific block to these persons and they immediately turned around and transferred it to his brother and to his wife, all the documents are here. Can we ask the PM if something like that would raise eyebrows or at least illicit an investigation of some sort?"

Rt. Hon. Dean Barrow, Prime Minister
"I don't know that there is any need for an investigation. If the facts are as you say and as the honorable member for Lake Independence recited, then that is to be condemned out of hand. There's no need for any investigation. All I'm saying is we are prepared to accept what is wrong and we are prepared to ensure that consequences attach to the wrong doer. That is the difference between this administration and the last administration."

Mike Rudon, BZ Times
"I have here a bunch of documents where the land was given to people in August and they transferred it the month before they got it, so they had already transferred the land to Ignacio German Vega before they even got it from the Government of Belize and it's a whole sheaf of documents."

Rt. Hon. Dean Barrow, Prime Minister
"If that is so that it may well be that those transfers are not valid and as the attorney general said, nobody brought the file to her but we are happy to receive your documents and she will no doubt call on the officials to do that to the extent that anything can be properly set aside because there was failure to comply with the law, it will be set aside."

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