“That is not true at all!” is what Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit has said in response to rumours that the government had approved over 15 applications from offshore bankers and granted them licenses to operate here in recent times.
“Only one offshore bank, this year, was granted a licence…some commonwealth bank,” Skerrit told the media at a press conference this week.
“There is no intention for the government to have too many offshore banks in Dominica, and any person who would make an application would have to go through a very rigorous process of applying… so any license that is granted and any decision that has been given in any concession to any company, big or small, we have it published in the official gazette of Dominica,” he noted.
The prime minister explained the procedure involved in obtaining an offshore bank license, stating that it is a transparent affair.
“Any decision for the government to give a licence to the bank has to be properly promoted in the official gazette. There’s nothing un-transparent about the process; a person makes and application … when the FSU[Financial Services Unit] is satisfied … a recommendation is made to the minister of finance, for the signing of the certificate granting and licensing and so forth,” he said.
Skerrit said that in some previous instances an applicant might meet the major requirements for obtaining a license, but may be missing one or two basic aspects. The applicants would sometimes be granted a license, but be given six months to satisfy the FSU that they have fulfilled the conditions specified, or else the license will be revoked.
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“…some Commonwealth bank…” Come on Mr. Minister of Finance. You should at least know the proper name of the bank.
@Mac-Arthur Haughton.
Unfortunately for us we were a decade too late into the game. Remember we started actively pursuing the offshore sector during the term of the UWP administration(1995-2000). With the OECD putting on the squeeze, especially with their infamous “Blacklist”, we stand little chance of significantly improving our position in the existing environment.
It’s a little disappointing that Dominica isn’t in the position to have 15 offshore banks, clambering over them selves to have approved offshore bank licences’. On the over hand one at a time is still good enough.