7 News Belize

GOB’s Investment Czar: Not Surprised At Puerto Azul
posted (January 19, 2017)
Two days ago we told you how the whole Puerto Azul project blew up in an international scandal as a massive ponzi scheme. Italian police say the developers defrauded tens of millions of dollars form investors by proposing a project which never materialized. That has put Belize in the worse kind of limelight, since a fantastical "8 star" resort near the Blue Hole was the centerpiece of the Puerto Azul scam. The resort was never built, but the developers did engage the Belizean government, and even got the Ministers of Tourism and Investment to appear at their launch party in France. Chair of the Cabinet Investment Committee Godwin Hulse never went to that party and today we asked what was his reaction when news broke that Puerto Azul was all a front to defraud investors:...

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"Were you surprised?"

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"Absolutely not. I was not surprised at all. Actually, the first time the project came and you know we had several meetings. I had my issues, I could catalogue them for you; one, was to put an airstrip anywhere near the reef. As an engineer I know that would not have work. Two, they were going to raise commercial paper and I had made it clear to them in a meeting. That is fine when you put that on paper, but show me the money. Anybody can come with certification that you can raise a billion dollars or two. But banks don't release money that easily and to tell me that 'oh money is no problem.' Anybody who tells me money is no problem, I get very excited, because money is always a problem to raise. So I was not surprised at all."

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"Sir, but did they take us for a ride? They'd used up significant psychic and administrative energy. You all had to review stuff from them, you all had to engage and these were basically con men."

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"Well I am not sure they took us for a ride. Because remember we do have a clear investment policy and a program, a fine point program. In fact we developed it pretty much after Puerto Azul. Puerto Azul came kind of in the middle of that and it was a learning process that we could in fact in the future know where to say no and know where to say yes."

"So, there two guys; one working out of Europe, one working out of the DR, were no surprised at all to me because at the end of the day we would not have moved forward until they have established some clear proof that money was available and they couldn't do that."

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"But is it something that you all could have had the good sense to simply dismiss out of hand. These people weren't serious. They did not have a title for the property to say 'see we own Sandbore Caye.'"

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"But Jules, I don't know what you mean by "dismiss out of hand?" We sent they and said come back to us when you have A, B, C and D and they never came back with A, B, C and D and that's where it languished."

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"But at the same time they continue to use the Blue Hole, the enlisted ministers in your cabinet, the cabinet where you sit. They enlisted the Prime Minister's wife to bolster this fraudulent caused."

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"Well hindsight is 20/20 vision and you can look back and say they enlisted. They never enlisted me. But the fact of the matter is those were in the so called areas of the project. This Puerto Azul started off looking big. They flaunted people. They actually showcased people like John Travolta and other people which would give you the essence that this also is credible."

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"Is it something that you all have spoken about at the highest levels in government that, it's lamentable that our ministers of economic development and tourism were at the 2014 Cannes event to launch this fraudulent project, thus giving it a legitimacy it never should have had?"

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"Not subsequently. At the time when they had gone I recall sitting in cabinet and the matter was discussed and the minister for tourism has said exactly what he said in an interview with you. But since this has happened now, it has not been discussed."

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"Is it a lesson for all parties going forward?"

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"Obviously. I mean as I said again, because I had been involved in securitization investigations back in 2004 to 2006, when this came and they talked about raising commercial paper and kind of showing us all sorts of ways that they could raise the money, I was so firm in saying "show me," because I know that banks don't let go money that easily. But yes, for the nation it is going forward."

"To me this just to me, has turned out to be a major Ponzi scheme. There are a lot of little ones floating around. This is a just a major one."

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"Should you all have minimum criteria to say that 'you cannot be considered as a legitimate investor, if you don't meet X minimum criteria?'"

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"But that is in place. That's what I was telling you. There is a 5-point criteria that was approved by cabinet, supported by the Opposition, which lays it out."

Reporter
"People high up in our government went all the way to Cannes basically to promote a deal for these people to actually raised funds. Is that something that our ministers should be doing as well as the wife of the Prime Minister?"

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"That's an interpretation that you and some people may have Marisol. I don't have that interpretation at all. As I said I am not one of those ministers that you can have going on any kind of junket to do anything. I am very careful. But Minister of Tourism and the Minister of Investment may have thought otherwise and perhaps at the time did not see it as though they were promoting in such a way."

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"When the people they say 8-star, shouldn't all of us have said "really.""

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Agriculture
"They never said 8-star to us. Never yet. Anybody, I would say the last I know was 5, so you missed 6 and 7. And I can recall and I don't want to misquote him, but I can recall the Prime Minister making the comment "man, $80,000 a night, who would have paid that?" So those things, but then they to sell it that 'oh there is these huge things like Cannes of course that only the very rich and very famous go.' But it was a non-starter with the government. That I can say."

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