By ALBERT NAISMITH,
Television Editor
HIBERNIAN chairman Mr David Duff talks on television tonight about the
''fast footwork'' that saw him gain control of the club for #100,000 and
transform it into Hibs plc, a company worth #9m.
He also talks freely about the links between him and Monaco-based
multi-millionaire Mr David Rowland, who lent him the necessary further
#800,000 to finance the buyout of Hibs, and who later received a gift of
30% of Hibs from Mr Duff in return for his ''expertise''.
This was transferred via a Panamanian-registered company owned by Mr
Rowland and his family, and was worth about #1.2m as the club was then
valued at #4m, Mr Duff tells reporter George Hume, of BBC Scotland's
investigative programme Focal Point.
It was another of Mr Rowland's companies, Monaco, that lent Mr Duff's
Highmace Ltd the original #800,000. This was paid back, with interest at
commercial rates, when Hibs plc went public.
Fans bought 62.5% of the available shares at that time, and #2m was
raised for the new company. Since then, Hibs -- who were looking for new
investments in the leisure business -- had the ''great good fortune'' to
hear about a chain of hotels and wine bars in the South-west of England.
They bought the company, Avon Inns, for #4m in cash and about #1.6m
worth of Hibs shares. The money was raised by a rights issue and Avon
Inns were on the books of one of Mr Rowland's companies, Inoco, as a
non-performing loan.
Asked about the transaction, Mr Duff tells Hume that he saw it as ''a
cheap deal that could make us money -- one that could bring us income
and, if we decided to capitalise on any of these units, would make us a
profit''. He would ''go to Timbuktu'' to do this for Hibs.
It is expected that further details will be sought by shareholders at
the next annual meeting of Hibernian plc, scheduled for next month , and
that further questions will be posed about what Mr Duff describes
tonight as his ''pipe dream'' in which his club would move from Easter
Road to Meadowbank Stadium.
The Edinburgh-born businessman and lifelong Hibs supporter admits the
development value of Hibernian's present ground could be
''astronomical'', and the kind of development he would like to see at
Easter Road ''would be a mixed development with office use, some
residential, perhaps some leisure -- a theatre, a sports centre. You can
do an awful lot on 20 acres''.
He has already approached Edinburgh District Council, the owners of
Meadowbank, about his idea, but the response has been ''neither negative
nor positive . . . simply down the middle of the road''.
He has also applied for planning permission to build flats on the old
car park near Easter Road. The ground itself, he says, ''must be the
last large area of central Edinburgh that is not developed''.
He goes on: ''It wouldn't be for that reason that I would ever
consider moving Hibs, or ever consider advising the shareholders to move
Hibs out of Easter Road. The only reason I would do that is if Hibs were
moving somewhere close by -- somewhere better.
''I think it would be to the club's benefit if we could obtain
Meadowbank and turn it into a super stadium.''
Mr Duff has already denied this week that he had any serious plans to
sell Easter Road. Hibernian's managing director, Mr James Gray, a
brother-in-law of Mr Duff, has also described the story as ''old''.
Other members of the present Hibs board include Mr Jeremy James, a
former associate of Mr Rowland, and Mr Rowland's ex-wife, Sheila
Rowland.
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