On Monday, January 21st, a consultation forum was held at the Teachers’ Resource Centre to introduce Phase 2 of the Residency by Investment Programme. It allows non-belongers who have a close relationship with the island, and have made significant investments to the island’s development to be granted permanent resident status without being subjected to regular immigrant regulations.
In order to facilitate the Government of Anguilla has contracted the services of Latitude Company. Its CEO, Mr. Eric Major, hails from Jersey. Both him and Mr. Christopher Willis, Managing Director for the America’s and the Caribbean, were on hand to explain the rudimentary aspects of Residency by Investment.
Mr. Major and Mr. Willis and their team are working to finalize information pertinent to the programme which will be compiled to create the necessary legislation that will govern the policies of Residency by Investment.
The Hon. Chief Minister, Mr. Victor Banks, spoke at the consultation. He said: “The Phase One consultation, which was held last year, concerned those non-belongers who already had a longstanding relationship with Anguilla. They would have already owned homes here and made investments in Anguilla. Phase One gave them an opportunity to get in on the Residency by Investment plan. Now we are rolling out Phase 2 for the other persons who are interested in having permanent residents here.”
“A number of persons have responded very positively. One of the key things that we have been able to do in the process was to bring this company, Latitude, on board. The Company has a great deal of experience in this area. The focus of the programme is Residency by Investment as well Tax Residency. These are two important aspects of the programme.
“We have engaged Latitude based upon our research and the fact that there are very few practitioners involved in this sector. We have had the good fortune of meeting with this group. They had made a proposal to us even before we sent out bids for proposals, and so we were able to contract their services. This is an area of business that we do not have the expertise in, and it does not make sense to talk about the programme unless we have persons with the experience and ability to deliver and to help us to formulate it.
“There is a relationship between the Latitude group and the Government of Anguilla. They will make sure that we are on the right track in identifying the right markets. They will also help us to put in place competitive arrangements so that we can benefit from this project.”
Mr. Banks insisted that the programme is not Citizen by Investment, but a ‘Resident’ by Investment programme.
In his presentation, Mr. Major created much interest among many of the attendees, particularly those of the expatriate community who have a keen interest in the residency programme.
