By Makeda Mikael
For the second time I plan to retire from active Aviation.
When I was sixty I established my dream FBO 2000 Antigua Ltd. as a what I thought would be a pre-retirement six month business only to find myself working full-time with a growing full-service FBO and the second largest movement Operator after LIAT at Bird Airport.
Recognizing that FBOs are difficult businesses as inheritance packages, and with the agreement of my children we sold our assets in FBO 2000 Antigua Ltd. to Signature Flight Operations Antigua Ltd.
They being the largest FBO Operator in the world (200+), only to find myself in less than a year back on Runway 10 as the new owner of 90% of the property formally owned by Stanford Development Company, comprising a 30,000 sq ft Hangar, fully furnished FBO Lounge, Reception, Conference Room and Multi-use Hall, plus an additional 26+ acres of prize land around the old Runway, now a parking Ramp.
This land never should have been sold to Stanford, and last year Sir Lester Bird, in a letter written to Hon. Robin Yearwood, Minister of Aviation recanted his former position admitting that the Cabinet Decision to sell airport lands was short-sighted.
The Government Purchase Agreement to SDC in 2003 was clearly drafted by SDC giving the lands full clearance of all encumbrances and easements at fee simple thereby guaranteeing SDC the opportunity to sell and assign the lands and their rights and privileges to new owners ad infinitum.
Further, the largest portion of the lands Plot 118 was designated specifically for the construction and operation of FBO and Ancillary Services. All of this was assigned to my companies.
We had endured years of fighting the SDC takeover of the lands which included the 1/4 acre of leased land where we operated from a tiny FBO building, serving our many jets on the remote location of Runway 10 (Dis-used).
By the time we reached the Privy Council with our demand for the continuation of our FBO business and the confirmation of our lease occupation, the business deals of the SDC owner had exposed him globally as a Ponzi schemer and my win was obscured by his international business takeover by U.S. Federal Agents and the rest is history.
The SDC liquidators resisted closing my matters in Court which included other cases against SDC for harassment, wrongful arrest, character assignation, and the business losses by years of suppression thereby costing my business, my family and myself what was quantified in millions.
To cover their costs as there was no cash the lands purchased by SDC inside the airport were assigned to my company which included the Hangar and the 26+ acres around Runway 10 (Dis-used), some of which I was forced to buy as it exceeded my claim. I was forced to return to aviation at Bird Airport.
For the past six years It has been hard fighting the Authorities who wish to get the lands back without paying fair market value, and not wanting any local person holding lands retained for white, Chinese, or Arab.
Since the installation of a local management team at Bird Airport life has become almost intolerable as the possibility of selling the land to the Chinese and the excessive millions offered is only tempered by the local ownership of Barnacle Point which is also desirous of owning neighboring properties.
The constant harassment of the Government and their failure to secure Runway 10 from the drugs and contraband traded on the remote area of the airport forced our company to take a very strict approach to the movements on our lands, which the Airport authority constantly overrules in order to keep the area unsupervised and loose for irregular movements especially at nights.
Customs has so far failed to make their demands on the airport for the Safety and Security of the remote area of the airport which has a long history of drugs and contraband before the introduction of FBO 2000 Antigua Ltd. to the area.
The four drive-through Gate checks per day only serves to alert the drug and contraband operators on Runway 10 of their free hours to cover their tracks and at night to wait for the official Gate 7 to be closed so their work can begin.
No longer feeling safe, and having been threatened by an arbitrary Operator on Runway 10, it is clear that the time has come for me to hand over my hands-on aviation skills to a younger generation. This I shall do by year end.
