Following the request of receivership of the company Haitel, by the General Tax Directorate (DGI), Jean Baptiste Clark Neptune, Director General of DGI has announced yesterday Thursday during a joint press conference with the National Council of Telecommunications (CONATEL) that the company Haitel was officially in receivership. A legal measure, which does not involve the closure of the company but that able to continue the operations while protecting the interests of the State, employees and minority shareholders.

Jean Marie Guillaume, Director of CONATEL has explained the situation to the press "...The Haitel problem is that it owes to several state institutions, including the CONATEL, BRH, BNC and other institutions, over 80 million dollars [nearly 40% to the Haitian government in taxes].

Haitel had reached a point where it could no longer operate, it could no longer pay its employees and could not even buy fuel for its generators to continue to operate [...] I can tell you that employees of Haitel have not been paid for over 5 months [...]

I would recall that the problem of Haitel began in the years 2005-2006, it is a problem that has worsened and that previous administrations have never tried to solve... Now it's us who are trying to address this problem, because as you can see, all parties are losers, employees do not touch, no longer works, the Haitian government is not able to recover debts that the Haitel owes him and the customer, very supportive with the Haitel, is not happy at all and wants the Haitel continues to provide a service [...]

Given that the Haitel has closed, without having informed the Conatel, the DGI, the BNC [...] we are obliged to sit to take a decision, to see how to solve this problem, so that the Haitel is able to begin to provide services on the market.

All I can say you, is that when a company closes, the first reaction of the DGI is to try to recover the money owed to the State [...] DGI has many legal means to recover the money, this is what makes today I'm sitting with the Director General of the DGI, because many people think it is the Conatel who closed the Haitel, that is the Conatel that can solve the problem by itself, today, I must tell you that the Conatel has to work with the DGI [...]

DGI will try to see how it will solve the problems with taxation and on my side I'll see how we can resolve problems at the technical level, we are already in talks with ZTE which is a technical supplier of the Haitel to assist us in this work..."

See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-5292-haiti-justice-the-mobile-phone-company-haitel-owes-nearly-$40mm-to-the-state.html

S/ HaitiLibre