Three former Antigua and Barbuda government ministers have been charged with corruption in connection with three Daewoo buses donated to the former Baldwin Spencer administration.
Leader of the main opposition United Progressive Party (UPP) Harold Lovell, along with former Education Minister Senator Dr. Jacqui Quinn-Leandro and former Health Minister, Wilmot Daniel have been charged with larceny, fraudulent conversion and corruption.
Lovell is a former finance minister in the former UPP government.
It is alleged that they converted the buses, valued at more than EC$600,000 (US$222,000), to their personal use and had the vehicles registered in their names. The buses were donated to the former UPP administration.
The case has been adjourned to Sept. 8.
The UPP said in a statement that the charges are politically motivated, and accused the ruling Antigua Labor Party (ALP) of attempting to deflect from its “dismal failures to deliver on any of the promises that it made to the electorate,” as it approaches its two-year anniversary in office.
‘The charges reflect a poor attempt to cover the political policing practiced by the Gaston Browne administration with the commissioner of police,” the statement said.
“The UPP stands firmly and resolutely with its leaders and our party is fully satisfied that at the end of the process, however, long it may take, our leaders will be vindicated,” it added.
Another top UPP official, Chairman Gisele Isaac, is facing charges relating to her term as executive secretary of the Board of Education.
