Leader of the Opposition Mia Mottley questioned the rush to sell the Hilton Hotel, stating that if the sale was so good why couldn’t it wait until after the elections.
Speaking at the BLP meeting held at Oistins, Christ Church on Sunday night, Mottley told thousand of supporters to stay tuned to see if a meeting will be held on Monday May 21 regarding the sale. She said, the meeting scheduled for three days before the general elections on a bank holiday must be stopped at all cost.
In fact, the government must not be allowed to” pick the duck back bare”, and that if called upon on Monday, Bajans might need to turn out in their thousands at Needham Point to ensure the meeting did not take place.She said the Democratic Labour Party cannot take up a property or things that have value and sell them without getting a return from it.
Mottley said the campaign is not about retribution, but they are times when you have to draw a line in the sand..and tonight is the night to do it in your name and our name.
She said the government is about to deplete the resources that will be available to us that will bring back this country on May 25th.From day one, she continued, Kerrie Symmonds and I said that you don’t sell free hold for “nex kin to nutting”.If you really need money they are ways to extract value from assets .The Opposition leader said, you can literally assign the profits for the next 20 years and you will still own the property for 25-30 years.
She said, when Errol Barrow got into trouble in 1974 with the oil crisis he could have leased the Hilton, and if he had leased it, it would have been available to us in 2004 to use again.
She continued, When Tom Adams had difficulties in 1981-82 and had to go the IMF he could have leased the Hilton …also assigned the property for 30 years and we would still have it in 2011- 2012. The point is in our life time it would come back to us to use ..but when you sell something it gone, it gone, she concluded.
