Philippe Martinez demanded $40M to $100M from St Kitts and Nevis to withdraw RICO: PM Drew

St Kitts and Nevis: Philippe Martinez has demanded $40 million to $100 million from the Government of St Kitts and Nevis to settle the RICO suit. 

Prime Minister Terrance Drew made the major declaration during Wednesday’s roundtable where he received multiple questions from members of the media on Martinez’s recent allegations. 

Drew said that French American movie director Philippe Martinez first arrived in Nevis as part of shooting several films. However, in May 2022 he became part of the Federation’s Citizenship by Investment Programme. 

Referring to Martinez as “somebody who’s convicted of fraud, and spent jail time for fraud”, PM added that a person like him should not have been made part of the programme in the first place. 

He further labelled the RICO Lawsuit filed by Martinez as an “extortion scheme” and questioned his millions of dollar demands.  

“That's about 10% of the budget. If you go to 100,000,000 US dollars, that is approaching a quarter of our annual budget. So, I said, how can you show up and say that if we want this to go away, we have to come up with 40million to 100 million US dollars? This gentleman has paid surrogates within the media, podcast, all over,” Prime Minister Drew further added. 

PM Drew Accuses Philippe Martinez of Self-Interest 

Prime Minister Terrance Drew added that Martinez does not care about the people of St Kitts and Nevis, and the conversation is more about Martinez himself. 

Drew stated that if Martinez cared about the people and St Kitts and Nevis, he would not have attempted to extort money from the public treasury. 

“He does not care about the people of St Kitts and Nevis. As it's obvious, he is about himself and what he perceives he can get. Because the question becomes if you care about St Kitts and Nevis, why are you attempting to extort tens of thousands of US dollars from the people of St Kitts and Nevis through the treasury?” Prime Minister questioned during the roundtable.  

Philippe Martinez Joined CBI In May 2022 

Prime Minister Terrance Drew stated that Martinez was made part of the CBI Programme by Previous Government, led by Former Prime Minister Timothy Harris in the May of 2022.  

According to Dr Drew, when he got into office, Philippe Martinez was already part of the CBI Programme. 

“You must be fully aware that I was not the prime minister at that time. It was another Prime Minister who admitted Mr. Martinez into our CBI programme.” 

He further noted after some time, they conducted some type of due diligence which led to find that the MSR owner was convicted for fraud.  

Furthermore, he also added that individuals with questionable background are not accepted in the civil services, yet the previous Government accepted Philippe Martinez to be part of the country’s citizenship by investment programme. 

Discussing in more details, Prime Minister said that Martinez was sentenced for 5 years in prison for fraud, and he served six months jail time in Europe 

Government is dealing with him in accordance with law 

Prime Minister Drew added that the Government is dealing with Philippe Martinez of MSR Media in accordance with the law.  

He mentioned that his government is the one that said since day one that this is the most difficult thing that they would have to deal with, but they are taking necessary steps and tough measures to distance such people from the CBI programme.  

The Prime Minister also added that due diligence has always been a critical point for him since he took over the Government. He added that the Government made the most significant changes to the CBI Programme.  

“My first action was to save the Programme, and make sure it can stand up to any scrutiny. When you make changes and implement them things are not gonna happen overnight, and we are moving as quickly we can.”

Drew said that his government also paused the controversial prison project assigned by the previous Timothy Harris Government. The Prime Minister said that this was done to ensure a proper review of the project. 

Prime Minister Terrance Drew stated that his government influenced other CBI jurisdictions in the region to make historic changes by leading the signing of an MOU.  

He said St Kitts and Nevis is committed to ensuring a thorough due diligence and introduced the first-ever Continuing International Due Diligence Unit to oversee the part.