[pbazar]

Tahiti Black Pearl Group Pushes For $4.5M Payment
Thursday: December 11, 2008

(Tahitipresse)

The GIE Perles de Tahiti, which is appealing its liquidation, now wants the Tong Sang government to reimburse it for its share of the suspended Tahiti cultured pearl export tax that was revoked by the Conseil d'Etat in Paris.


The GIE, or economic interest group, is claiming its share of the uncollected tax amounts to nearly 400 million French Pacific francs (US$4.5m/€3.35m), according to a media communiqué from Alfred Martin, the GIE's board chairman.

By recovering such a sum of money, "the GIE Perles de Tahiti, obviously, will no longer be bankrupt, and its masterminded destruction will be doomed to failure," Martin said in his statement.

The Tong Sang government suspended the pearl export tax for the last three months of this year. The 15-year-old non-profit GIE claims that without the tax it was unable to remain in business because that money was what helped allow it to promote the Tahiti cultured pearl and its byproducts throughout the world.

The money collected by long-existing tax was split up on a 60 percent-40 percent basis, with the larger share going to the government. The GIE claims that its share of the pearl export tax represented 95 percent of its financial resources.

Last Friday, the Conseil d'Etat (Council of State), France's Supreme Court for administrative justice, revoked the export tax suspension vote in August by the French Polynesia Assembly. The council ruled that the vote involved a conflict of interest because Michel Yip, a Tuamotu pearl producer, was present when the voting occurred. Yip is also a former pearl minister in a previous government.

The Perles de Tahiti's liquidation appeal case is due to be heard on Dec. 17 by the Papeete Mixed Commercial Court, which ordered the GIE's liquidation on Nov. 24. Martin said he also has initiated proceedings to obtain the annulment of the GIE's liquidation, which is due for a ruling on Jan. 22.

Martin said he based his claim for the 400 million French Pacific franc reimbursement on the government's reported Tahiti cultured pearl exports during October, the first month that the export tax was not collected.

The government's Council of Ministers issued a media communiqué last month reporting that the exports of loose Tahitian pearls increased 84 percent during October.

Martin's communiqué said the GIE represented and defended the interests of "about 80 percent of pearl producers" in French Polynesia. That involves "Polynesian families who have only the production of their pearls and mother-of-pearl shells to live on in their atolls," he said.

Those families refuse "to depend on a few large producers and wholesalers looking to become the only operators in the market and who, to that end, had requested and obtained the" pearl export tax suspension, Martin charged.

Meanwhile, four major Tahiti cultured pearl associations claiming to represent "more than 80 percent" of Tahiti's pearl exports have agreed to regroup and form a new professional organization.

Monday's media communiqué announcing the regrouping made no mention of the former GIE Perles de Tahiti. However, the four associations that met last Thursday to regroup were represented on the GIE's board.

The four associations' presidents are Robert Wan (SPPP), Philippe Chenne (SEPT), Georges Mataoa (SPMPPF) and Elisabeth Moe (GIE Poe o Tahiti Nui). Wan, head of the Robert Wan Group, is the world's biggest producer of Tahitian cultured pearls

[effisk]

Originally Posted by pearlescence

Hi Josh. Retrospective tax is unlawful.

If that was the case in French Polynesia, they wouldn't even be discussing it and starting petitions.

I wonder where the newly created GIE PPNPP which claims 400 farmers as members is hiding, we haven't heard from them recently...

[effisk]

ok here's a good one.

Most of you remember that a law was voted by the local Assembly last August in Tahiti. This law suspended the DSPE - the tax on exported pearls - from the 1st of October until the 31st of December 2008.

One of the representants of the assembly who voted in favor of this law was Michel Yip, a pearl farmer. The opposition asked the State Council to cancel the suspension, on the basis that the pearl farmer should not have voted the law because he had stakes in the industry.

In the meantime, pearl farmers started to sell, and traders to export the pearls at a much lower price and in much higher volume than before, due to the tax suspension.

This law put the GIE Perles de Tahiti (in charge of the promotion of the said pearls) in a difficult situation: most if not all of its revenues came from this tax. Without revenues, it was soon unable to pay its debts, and was declared bankrupt by the local courthouse.

Then late December, the State Council ruled against the law, declaring that Michel Yip being a pearl farmer, he should not have voted. This meant that the traders and pearl farmers were supposed to pay the tax for all pearls that had been exported since 1st of October. It also meant that the GIE PdT was theorically no longer bankrupt; the GIE therefore filed against the decision by the courthouse.

Most pearm farmers were not too comfortable with the situation to say the least. The petitioned and pressured the Assembly to vote the suspension again, Which they did, retroactively, from 1st Oct 2008 until December 2009.

But wait!
While this happened, the GIE was declared not bankrupt for the reason explained above. But because of the last law, it's technically bankrupt again.

But wait!
Some of the representants at the Assembly who voted the new suspension are pearl farmers, and even if one of the leaders of the opposition voted for the law (against all odds), there are good chances that someone in the opposition will appeal to the State Court... which would bring us back to the beginning of the story.

Tahitians are becoming better at French politics than the French themselves!

[pearlescence]

Do these pearl farmers who are voting and not declaring an interest not face any penalty?Am I thinking dull english law and not exciting unpredictable french here?

[effisk]

Originally Posted by pearlescence

Do these pearl farmers who are voting and not declaring an interest not face any penalty?Am I thinking dull english law and not exciting unpredictable french here?

The most probable penalty would be their dismissal; but that's not going to happen. The situation is bad with local economy at its lowest, the country's budget for 2009 has not been voted yet and there are good chances that 2009 will see a not-so-new president (that would be its 10th change since 2004, with only three different presidents).

[effisk]

Originally Posted by effisk

...there are good chances that someone in the opposition will appeal to the State Court

Originally Posted by effisk

... and there are good chances that 2009 will see a not-so-new president (that would be its 10th change since 2004, with only three different presidents).

from now on please call me the Pythia.

[Slraep]

Originally Posted by effisk

from now on please call me the Pythia.

Effisk, I thought you were a GUY. Not some chick high on ethylene gas fumes and sitting in a caldron on a tripod.

Slraep

[effisk]

Originally Posted by Slraep

Effisk, I thought you were a GUY. Not some chick high on ethylene gas fumes and sitting in a caldron on a tripod.

Slraep

gotcha. I KNEW you couldn't refrain from making that exact comment! (less the caldron and the tripod)

Posted this one just for you

[Slraep]

Originally Posted by effisk

gotcha. I KNEW you couldn't refrain from making that exact comment! (less the caldron and the tripod)

Posted this one just for you

Note in the edit: I added the cauldron and the tripod as an afterthought. Freaky! Then it is true, what SHE wrote about your ability to SEE!

Slraep

[GemGeek]

Effisk, I've been wondering what will be up with my love life in 2009...oh, and am I going to come into any money?

[Slraep]

GemGeek, what an excellent idea about effisk using his extrasensory powers for more than just SEE-ing when and where the best surf is up.

I am wondering if I will ever make any money as a writer. Or at least start my own blog.

[Marama]

GIE PDT is back from the "dead" ...

[effisk]

Originally Posted by Marama

GIE PDT is back from the "dead" ...

I did not see that one coming. So... there's no tax anymore... where will the money be coming from?

[Valeria101]

Doesn't look like the new GIE will be fiddling around with a common pot for beauty pageants, does it...

[Slraep]

Originally Posted by effisk

I did not see that one coming.

Pythia indeed! Hah!

Slraep
PS. I know, I know, you wrote that because you KNEW I'd make this comment.