Is NICIL state-owned or not, Mr. Brassington?

Jan 31, 2013 Letters

DEAR EDITOR,
I have never in my life laughed as hard as I did on Tuesday morning before heading off to work as I read your news article, “Brassington seeks $204M compensation for Linden building,” (January 29).
Appearing before the Linden Commission of Inquiry, NICIL’s Executive Director, Mr. Winston Brassington, NICIL was seeking $204.7M to replace the building that housed the Linden arm of NICIL and other businesses.
He then provided a breakdown of how he arrived at the cost for every section, but the news report never cited any property valuation report that was prepared prior to the destruction, nor did the news report ever state that the commissioners asked why wasn’t the building insured, which would have made sense if Mr. Brassington was a wise steward.
And that brings me to this question: Are government buildings insured?
Moving on, the news report then noted that in response to Commissioner K. D. Knights’s belief that the request for compensation is tantamount to the government compensating the government, Mr. Brassington explained that NICIL is not government-owned, but government is a shareholder.
So, here is my second question: Besides government, who are the other shareholders of NICIL? In fact, I would like to know the percentage breakdown of the shareholders. That going braggadocios, he boasted how he worked ‘long enough’ in the corporate world to know that shareholders don’t own a company.
The legal explanations here vary depending on whom you speak with, but while shareholders do own shares and the board members provide policy oversight and directives to the management team, the shareholders are ‘technically’ the owners, because if they withdraw their shares, the company could become insolvent if the board members cannot find replacement shareholders.
That academic debate aside, here is what Mr. Brassington is saying: the government has significant shares in NICIL, but does not own it. The other shareholders – whoever they are – have shares in NICIL, but do not own it. So who exactly owns NICIL, which derives its business activities and revenue generation from sale of and managing state-owned assets? Do you see why I laughed so hard?
On top of that, Mr. Brassington said NICIL was not constituted by an Act of Parliament; however, it is still state-owned. Wait a minute! Didn’t I just type above that Mr. Brassington reportedly said NICIL is not government-owned?
As of this moment, I know that NICIL was launched by the Desmond Hoyte administration, making it a government-owned entity, to handle government properties and assets. How government became a shareholder is not clear, neither is it clear who the other shareholders are and whether they meet or have any say in NICIL’s operations.
In the meantime, I am going to now sit back and wait for my fellow patriot, Mr. Christopher Ram, to dissect Mr. Brassington’s brow-raising testimony before the Linden Commissioners.
In fact, if NICIL did not come into existence by virtue of an Act of Parliament, then what parliamentary rule says NICIL is required to present its audited accounts to Parliament, and what is the legal basis for that requirement?
Emile Mervin

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