In a perfect world the former government should have gotten more for BTC, but people pay what the market will bear. At the time BTC's profits were declining as a result of VOIP and Internet etc so maybe they got the best deal they could?
During the 2012 election campaign the present government said they would "take BTC back". "Negotiating" a deal whereby less than 2% of shares are placed in a in a charitable trust with no board or management control is quite different. Now if we are judging CWC's gift to the government for attempting to brow beat them to help save face, well it's a good deal. But considered in the light of all the political rhetoric that went down about taking the company back, it's a joke.
Also in hindsight it might have been better to contract an independent management firm and then maybe sell equity in the form of shares, getting government out of it altogether?
But, some Bahamians were not asking for 100% of the shares to be sold to Bahamians as a share offering? They wanted it sold to some Bahamians whether they could meet the requirements or not. As mentioned recently, one gets the feeling that certain people wanted it sold to Bahamians simply because it was profitable and a few more Bahamians could be instant millionaires. Not exactly a sound position for the future of the business.
Don't mean to speculate what people meant, but I don't see any of those folks clamouring to buy ZNS, Bahamasair or even get into the cellular business.
The simple answer is the government should get on with the liberalisation process and sell their 49% equity on the capital market. Hopefully Bahamians are able to buy the shares as well as get in the phone business with cellular ventures and more.
The political rhetoric has hopefully reached its zenith and common sense will begin to set in.
I'm not sure these are my last words on this subject either.
