NICA Dead

Let us Take NICA off Life Support. A group of shareholders of the National Investment Company of Anguilla Ltd met on 2 October at Bob Rogers’ home to consider the meeting that had taken place with the directors on 27 September. The number of members attending and showing interest continues to rise.

Concerns were expressed about the failure of the Board to have taken any steps to prosecute the offences revealed in the Report of Mr Avondale Thomas to the Court in Bob Rogers’ court case of 2003.

Others expressed worry on learning that the Board had leased the Wholesale Building to the Rum Factory at very unfavourable terms. They were paying rent of about $3,500.00 per month instead of $7,000.00. It was also noticed that the Rum Factory was trespassing onto land that they had not been leased. They were proposing to build 10,000 sq ft of storeroom on it.

What was even more worrying was the Board’s expressed intention to bring in to a future general meeting teams of experts to persuade us to let them develop the Gibbons Estate lands owned by the company at Lockrums. Members agreed that after nearly twenty years of mismanagement and inactivity, the company was brain dead and should now be taken off life support machines. The time for the Board to be coming with schemes to develop land was long past.

Particularly worrying to some was the announcement made on radio just that morning that the Board was calling a general meeting of shareholders to elect new directors and appoint new auditors on 22 October at 5:00 pm at the Stoney Ground Primary School. There was general consensus that the company should be taken out of its misery. It was time to apply to the court for a court supervised voluntary winding up. That means that it is pointless to appoint new directors. They will be replaced by the Liquidator immediately he is appointed.

Members also considered that it was pointless to conduct an audit of the company’s accounts over the previous thirteen years. It is not as if there would be an incoming new Board that needed to know what the state of the accounts was. We were now past the stage where audits were required. It would be a waste of money to audit the accounts just before the company was put into liquidation. Members agreed that the ideal Liquidator would be Mr Thomas. He would not need an audit to be presented to him for him to know what to do.

Several members expressed the strong desire that there be a resolution for the company to be wound up on the agenda of any future shareholders’ meeting. Members approved the following resolution to be submitted to the Board of Directors for inclusion in the official Notice calling the meeting: Resolved: That the National Investment Company of Anguilla Ltd be voluntarily wound up, under the supervision of the Court, that the assets of the company be sold, that the debts be paid off, and the balance distributed among the shareholders. Mr Avondale Thomas of Antigua to be the Liquidator of the company.