27 days ago we wrote to the Ministry of Finance asking about the 283k in public funds which were sent through the Bella Vista Toledo Teachers Credit Union without a proper source of funds.
Now if you don't know, a source of funds declaration is a critical requirement to determine that money laundering is not happening. We are still waiting for the reply from the Ministry of Finance which has asked for an extension to June 5th.
But it has raised some questions about area rep Osmond Martinez, the former CEO for economic development which awarded the contracts to a favored contractor in the constituency. It also illustrates the complicity of the management of the Toledo Teachers Credit Union - which ignored all compliance requirements.
Jules Vasquez spoke to the general manager about it yesterday.
In the special investigation report it points to, quote, "a mysterious case of two business accounts opened at the Bella Vista Branch which belonged to a married couple. These accounts were flagged by the Compliance Officer initially because the funds deposited in the accounts were very significant and not supported by the documentation in the file." Those funds were deposited from the government treasury in an amount close to three hundred thousand dollars.
The General Manager said there was no clear source of funds - which is the biggest red flag in banking:
Leopoldo Romero, General Manager, TTCU
"Yes, it came through the treasury, the source of funds were incomplete so we had to cut off business with them, we had to close the accounts and then they moved that to some other institution."
Jules Vasquez:
"Monies coming through from the treasury?"
Leopoldo Romero, General Manager, TTCU
"From the treasury."
Jules Vasquez
"At what point did you terminate those relations? The last transaction I saw was August 2024."
Leopoldo Romero, General Manager, TTCU
"Right, in August 2024 we even sent back an amount of money to the treasury because the contract was not signed, the source of funds were not proper, so the money came, we put it into payables and we sent it back to the treasury and that happened around that same time as well when we cut off business with them."
Those contracts came from the Ministry of Economic Development between February 2023 to August 2024. The current Toledo East Area Representative Osmond Martinez - where Bella Vista is the largest population center is known to have a close acquaintance with one of the principals of these companies, Jose Felipe Flores who is a prominent political supporter. Martinez is named in the report as having signed one of the contracts and says he submitted all the required contract information as a source of funds to Romero:
Jules Vasquez
"So now I have spoken to Mr Martinez and he says that he met with you and he says that he sent you the contracts and he showed me a screenshot of an email showing you three contracts but what is your reaction to that?"
Leopoldo Romero, General Manager, TTCU
"I met with Mr Martinez, he's a good friend of mine, we have met several times when he was a CEO and we have discussed funding from outside agents. And during that meeting, he called Belmopan and told his secretary to send me the contracts via email and up to today, I have not received those contracts so I don't think that matter is correct and if those emails or those contracts were sent to me, then where are they?"
Jules Vasquez
"What Mr Martinez says, it was just a mix up, the signed contracts exist, it's just that the contractor was pushing, he was to proceed and he was submitting a contract with only one signature while they in Belmopan had the contract with the two signatures. He said it was just a mix up."
Leopoldo Romero, General Manager, TTCU
"I am yet to see that because he promised to provide me with the original contracts, which up to today I don't have, even if you go through all my emails, and I was looking forward to getting those to put them in the file to prove to the regulators that we are doing our due diligence on these accounts and so if he had sent me, I would have easily printed them and put them there but if you go to those files right now, they're not there."
And this is a fundamental difference, Martinez showed us this screenshot but Romero insists he never got this email - not even in his SPAM.
But, for the credit union this is not what led to the definitive break:
Jules Vasquez
"Was it unusual that these government contracts, or these government disbursements for public works would be coming without a clearly documented source of funds?"
Leopoldo Romero, General Manager, TTCU
"It is very unusual and like I said in the beginning, there was collusion with the branch manager and these people."
"Our compliance officer was the one who looked at the account and saw there was false information there, if your address is Ecumenical Street in Dangriga and you are in Bella Vista, when we went to Dangriga, there is no such office. So those cemented the actions we took right after that, closed the accounts, we can't do business like this."
And that's why the TTCU walked away and left it to higher authorities:
Leopoldo Romero, General Manager, TTCU
"It is an issue of the FIU and the Central Bank who investigate such situations."
Notably, the Credit Union could have faced a fine of $200,000, the minimum penalty charged to an entity for violations of Section 3 of the Money Laundering and Terrorism Prevention Act - but we are told they escaped that fine.
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