TT: Frozen assets in hot FL

A FLORIDA court has enforced a local High Court order which prevents former Finance Minister Brian Kuei Tung from selling two South Florida properties together valued at millions of US dollars.

Kuei Tung is among 13 people and five companies accused of conspiring to defraud the Government, the Airports Authority, and the people of Trinidad and Tobago, of over $144 million, during the construction of the Piarco Airport New Terminal Development Project.

The State alleges that those charged engaged in a conspiracy to defraud the State by setting up ghost companies to work on the project and billed the Airports Authority for millions of dollars which subsequently found itself into the secret offshore accounts of the conspirators.

On May 27, attorneys representing Director of Public Prosecutions Geoffrey Henderson obtained an order from the High Court which froze Kuei Tung's assets.

A day later, Attorney General John Jeremie directed Miami attorney Edward Davis, of the law firm Astigarraga Davis Mullins and Grossman to make a similar application before Florida's 11th Circuit Court and a order was obtained.

I want to know how much do government officials in TT get paid that Kuei Tung can own South Florida properties valued in USD millions. Sounds too much like another Johnny O' and Panama. What did Rudder sing? "Thief the money, thief the money, thief the money!"

The courts will decide if Kuei Tung came by his assets legally, but there is enough precedent to justify one's thinking that Kuei Tung is just another government bandit. Anyway, the law will sort it all out.