Michael Misick
Former Premier of the Turks and Caicos Islands
TURKS AND CAICOS – I feel a debt of deep personal sadness to learn of the forced closure of the first indigenous Bank by the FSC and the Dictator Gordon Wetherall administration.
My heart and solidarity goes out to the thousands of working men and women that now have in some cases their life savings at risk.
Is it a coincidence that some persons like Clive Stanbrook were notified in advance of the bank’s closure which enabled him to move millions of dollars out of the bank thereby helping its demise while average men and women are left to suffer?
It has come to my attention that the chairman of the bank and lawyers of a proposed purchaser of the majority shares were in a meeting and hours away from concluding a deal to save the bank, when they got the news of its closure. The pending sale was known both to the FSC and Gordon Wetherall.
The forced closure of TCI Bank by Gordon Wetherall is just another attempt by the British Government and their installed dictator Gordon Wetherall to dismantle all the institutions that were created to advance our country towards nationhood. It’s also a further attempt by Gordon Wetherall and his supporters to ensure control of the economy of the islands in the hands of a few white elite British expats.
It is ironic that the same week ‘The People’s Bank’ closed, permission was granted to a Cayman based bank that is associated with Clive Stanbrook and the Grace Bay Boys to operate a new bank.
It has also come to my attention that less than $3 million dollars could have saved the bank from collapse. National Insurance, which is one of the major shareholders of the bank, have over one hundred million dollars in British and Canadian banks both in the islands and outside.
A decision should have been made in the interest of the thousands of customers and the good name of the country for National Insurance to place deposits with TCI bank to prevent its collapse.
Let me be clear under my leadership or a PNP administration we would never have allowed TCI Bank to fail and have thousands of working people lose their life savings.
Just as President Obama did in the USA and Gordon Brown did in the UK and other leaders did around the world when they spent Billions of dollars to bail out banks to avoid working people losing their savings, I call on Gordon Wetherall to stop making excuses and step up to the plate, rescue and bail out TCI bank to protect the reputation of the Turks and Caicos and prevent thousands of people from losing there life savings.
If the British care one ounce about the Turks and Caicos people this is the least they can do.
If this is not done this will confirm my suspicion that this too is part of a wider British conspiracy to stop at nothing in their efforts to stop the progress of our beautiful Islands and implement their colonial agenda of keeping us poor while making sure the few British elite reap the benefits of our country.
