By Peter Binose

Vincentian politicians have been traveling to Panama via Trinidad and Saint Kitts to deposit large sums of stolen state cash. Travelling on diplomatic passports and carrying diplomatic bags.

I am calling on the US authorities to investigate the airline passenger lists to see who these people are.

There are a number of politicians in SVG who have become recognizably rich on the measly State salary for MP’s and Senators. Owning several big cars, several big houses, lands and other property, investments in substantial new Vincentian companies. Several hide some of their ill gotten assets through their wives, their women, and family. Money is being laundered through in some cases loss making projects and under-trading small shops and businesses, low or no turn over with high banking receipts.

All of that wealth has been accumulated during their terms in Parliament. You can see them strutting in $1000 dollar suits, $500 dollar designer shoes, hand stitched shirts, gold watches. They don’t even try and hide their opulence.

Money was previously hidden in the HSBC bank in Switzerland and Lichtenstein, now it’s piling up in Panama.

Panama is vulnerable to money laundering (ML) from a number of sources including drug trafficking and other predicate crimes committed abroad such as fraud, financial crimes committed in Caribbean countries by government ministers and tax crimes.

It is a country with an open, US dollarized economy and, as a regional and international financial and corporate services center, offers a wide range of offshore financial and corporate services. It is also a transit point for drug trafficking from South American countries with some of the highest levels of production and trafficking of illegal drugs in the world. These factors put the country at high risk of being used for ML. Although the authorities have not conducted a risk assessment, they attribute the largest sources of ML to drug trafficking and other predicate crimes committed abroad. No information or estimates were provided on the extent of domestic and foreign predicate crimes and the amount of related ML in Panama. No terrorism financing (TF) cases have been detected so far, but with newly started direct flights from Turkey and the UAE, that will happen sooner or later. Because neither of those countries have any traditional trade with Panama except perhaps offshore banking.

Saint Vincent and the Grenadines since joining the ALBA alliance and the close association with Venezuela has become one of, if not the major cocaine smuggling route into the United States. There have also been some references of Iranians with Vincentian citizenship involved in money laundering in the Caribbean, even the US government referred to such a matter.

We are sinking in the mire of corruption and we need help, we need help from our traditional friends the US and the UK. We cannot rely on our new Marxist minded friends they are too close to the very regime that is bleeding and raping the country.

People have been assassinated and disappeared in SVG and we need help now.

DISCLAIMER: The opinion, belief and viewpoint expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinion, belief and viewpoint of iNews Cayman/ieyenews.com or official policies of iNews Cayman/ieyenews.com.

IMAGE: premieroffshore.com