“Mr. Ganley’s involvement in Albania left many thousands impoverished”
This story is the result of false rumours and originates from unreliable Albanian web sites. In 1996, Declan Ganley was involved in the creation of the Anglo-Adriatic Investment fund. The fund’s role was to help Albanian Citizens benefit from the privatisation of Albanian state assets during the transition period from Communism.
The Anglo-Adriatic Investment Fund was never involved in the fraud associated with so-called pyramid banks or pyramid schemes. Indeed it actively campaigned against such pyramid schemes and called for them to be shut down.
Anglo-Adriatic was established as the only licensed ‘privatisation voucher’ fund-holding entity. The Albanian government were to identify a number of state-owned assets of appropriate value that were to be privatised by way of a voucher privatisation process. A limited number of vouchers were issued to almost every household in Albania and the concept was that the vouchers should be exchanged for a share of the assets to be privatised by the Albanian government.
The objective of the Anglo-Adriatic fund, as provided for in government legislation, was to pool privatisation vouchers owned by Albanian voucher holders and to enter into discussions with potential foreign investors who would bring cash, expertise and other assets. The result was intended to be privatised assets derived from the voucher holders’ shares that had the benefit of external investment and know how to create added value for all shareholders.
Albanian voucher holders who took the option of pooling vouchers with Anglo Adriatic deposited their vouchers in the Savings Bank of Albania (the appointed custodian bank for Anglo Adriatic). This was part of the licensing conditions for Anglo Adriatic. That is to say, Anglo Adriatic could never actually physically hold those vouchers. Every single voucher placed into the fund in this manner is still in physical existence today in the bank vaults controlled by the Albanian Central Bank. Not one single voucher investor has ‘lost’ their holding as the holding exists and is secured in a vault belonging to Raiffeisen Bank under the control of the Albanian Central Bank. Anglo-Adriatic has made multiple attempts to have subsequent governments of Albania offer assets of appropriate value in exchange for those vouchers.
Unfortunately, the Albanian government has not done this to date. In deference to the Albanian government, there have been some mitigating circumstances. In 1997, the collapse of the aforementioned pyramid schemes led to massive civil unrest and a state of near civil war. This break down in civil law and order resulted in a mass evacuation of foreign nationals carried out by NATO forces including Italian, British, US, French and other forces. Anglo-Adriatic staff were airlifted by the US Marine Corps (who were responsible for securing the sector of Tirana where Anglo Adriatic’s office was located) and flown to safety on the USS Nassau which was stationed in the Adriatic. It is hoped and anticipated that the Albanian government will eventually find an appropriate mechanism to honour and redeem the Anglo Adriatic related vouchers and thus provide those voucher holders with appropriate value for their holdings.
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Originally Posted by FutureTaoiseach
