If you didn't have the opportunity to watch last night's panel discussion, conducted by investigative journalist NIKKI PHOENIX, featuring three Antiguan attorneys and yours truly, regarding the ALFA NERO Antigua yacht scandal, you missed an outstanding detailed analysis of the issues. We learned that the government of Antigua was offered $67m for the seized Russian Yacht, valued at USD$150m, but curiously accepted a much smaller $40m offer. Moreover, $4m of the purchase price was not delivered at closing, and only when issues were raised did part of the unpaid balance get remitted. A suspicious $450,000 "referral fee," paid to an Antiguan diplomat, also was part of the unfolding scandal.
The most disturbing aspect of the new information revealed at this discussion is the fact that the yacht is mysteriously now being offered for sale, by the new owners, at a price substantially higher than it was sold for by Antigua. Was the entire sale a sham, intended to benefit undisclosed senior members of the Government of Antigua, specifically to benefit Prime Minister GASTON BROWNE, who is reputed to have received a secret "commission" at the rate of 50%?
Antigua attorney VERE BIRD III raised the important point of who will pay for the ultimate disposition of the Russian claims that the vessel, which contained an extremely valuable art collection, was illegally sold. The mysterious missing government file, which cannot now be found, the fact that the sales proceeds does not appear in government accounts, and the disclosure by the country's digital information head that all the data on the sale have been wiped from digital records, all add up to a criminal conspiracy to enrich certain parties hiding in the shadows, including by not limited to GASTON BROWNE. We doubt that the answers will ever surface, and the people of Antigua will most likely end up paying the bill for the illegal sale, and diversion of proceeds from, a Russian luxury yacht that Antigua had no legal right to sell whatsoever.
Our thanks to DR. KEN SAMUEL, VERE BIRD III, and the HON. SHERFIELD BOWEN, for their active participation on the program, and Nikki Phoenix for moderating.
Here is my segment:





















