Thursday, August 30, 2007

America's Cup back in NZ hands?

According to an affidavit, sworn by Tom Ehman, Head of External Affairs for BMW ORACLE Racing, the Sociéte Nautique de Genève and the Royal New Zealand Yacht Club could have an arrangement, under which the America’s Cup would return to the RNZYS.

Ehman says: Using its unfettered powers under the Protocol, SNG has devised two schemes to escape adjudication of this dispute by the New York courts. Its first scheme, I have heard, relies upon a provision in the Deed of Gift which states that if a "Club holding the Cup be for any cause dissolved, the Cup shall be transferred to some Club of the same nationality, but, in the event of the failure of such transfer within three months after such dissolution, such Cup shall revert to the preceding Club holding the same."

I have heard that SNG has considered resigning as trustee and refraining from transferring the Cup to another Swiss yacht club within three months. It would then invoke the above quoted provision as a basis for returning the Cup to the preceding trustee, the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron ("RNZYS"). In turn, RNZYS would accept SNG as the challenger of record and decline, or ignore, GGYC's challenge of July 11, 2008. Such a gambit would, of course, violate the Deed of Gift. - Cathy McLean Full story
Photo Giles Martin-Raget/BMW