Regional leaders give commitment to write off debt owed by LIAT

Antigua Breaking News (ABN) — A number of regional leaders have given their commitment to write of debts owed to them by LIAT — which is now in Administration — Prime Minister Gaston Browne revealed Saturday.

Administrator Cleveland Seaforth has been negotiating with creditors asking them for certain debt write offs. 

“In fact, that matter was raised yesterday by me with some of the heads within the region and they have all committed to writing off their debt,” Prime Minister Browne said.

“So I believe sometime during the course of [this] week that we’ll be hearing from the various Heads within the region to write off the outstanding airport taxes and other fees that were due by LIAT.”

Prime Minister Browne said the Administrator is also speaking with other creditors, adding that the whole idea is to get to a significant write down in the liabilities so that there could be some level of severance paid to the staff. 

“If the administrator is unable to achieve that then there will be a problem — even if there is severance paid, they will be nominal. But the deeper the write downs, then the larger the amount of severance that will be paid to the staff, so that is the exercise that the Administrator is undertaking to get completed as soon as possible,” Browne said.

Meanwhile, the Antigua and Barbuda leader said the Administrator continues to negotiate with a few prospective investors.

“I’m not aware that there’s any firm deal as yet but we still remain hopeful that within the 120-day period that we will have LIAT back in the air,” he said. 

“That is still the objective, we have not changed the timeline and we are working towards it.