BRUCE Golding yesterday dared the Bank of Jamaica to sue him for libel and ridiculed an apology to the central bank by the owners of HOT 102 FM for critical remarks he made on a show he hosts on the station.

“In the circumstance, I consider the apology unwarranted and gratuitous,” Golding said as he opened his Disclosure programme.

In fact, Golding said that his lawyers had not only told the BOJ that the bank was not libelled, but had also advised the central bank “that if they wish to pursue legal action, my attorneys were authorised to accept service on my behalf”.

Last night, a central bank source suggested that the BOJ would accept the challenge from Golding, who is also a senior leader of the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP).

“We are pursuing legal action against him,” said the source, who declined to be named. “He is bluffing to save some face and trying to make it seem that the issue is about other things than what is really the issue.”

It also emerged publicly yesterday that it was Golding’s growing concern about editorial interference on the part of the management of HOT 102 that triggered his decision to resign from the programme, which he announced earlier this month.

Golding is to host his last Disclosure show tomorrow, an obligation that both he and the station’s management indicated that he would keep despite the fact that their disagreement spilled over into the public.

“He is still going right through until the end of the week,” said HOT 102’s acting general manager and senior director for the CVM Group, Wayne Smith. “He leaves on the 28th — Thursday.”

Golding has hosted the programme for more than a year, taking up the talk show months after resigning as president of the National Democratic Movement (NDM), the political party he founded in 1995 after leaving the JLP to promote an agenda of political reform. He returned to the JLP last September, only weeks before the general elections, and was credited with playing a major part in the Opposition party’s strong showing in the vote.

Lambert Brown, the trade unionist who hosts the Disclosure talk show on Fridays, has also resigned from the programme in solidarity with his senior colleague.

Golding’s outburst yesterday was triggered by an apology broadcast on CVM television Monday night — apparently on behalf of the CVM Group, of which HOT 102 is a member — for remarks Golding made on his programme on May 14. His comments related to a controversial acquisition of a house by the BOJ and other aspects of the management of the central bank.

According to that apology, there was “no truth whatsoever” to allegations made by Golding and who had done so “without any effort to ascertain their veracity from the Bank of Jamaica”.

The statement “unconditionally and absolutely” disassociated HOT 102 from “all allegations made by Mr Golding”.

Last night, a source close to the CVM Group’s legal team indicated that the company’s decision to back down was out of fear of big libel awards that have been made in Jamaica recently, including one for $20 million against CVM TV.

“It was strictly a business decision,” said the source.

Golding started his programme yesterday with a biting retort, explaining that his own lawyers had found nothing libellous in his comments and claiming that CVM Group’s own lawyer had advised at a meeting he attended on May 14 that the comments did not constitute libel.

Golding stressed that the terms under which he conducted Disclosure gave him editorial control of the programme, subject only to the laws of libel and broadcasting regulation. He insisted that he had breached neither of these terms and therefore considered the CVM Group apology “editorial interference which violates the terms under which I was engaged”. That was what caused him to resign.

Said Golding: “I offer no apology whatsoever to the Bank of Jamaica. I am under no obligation to seek to be on nice terms with the Bank of Jamaica, especially at the expense of the truth. It is not true, as the statement from HOT 102 says, that the allegations that I made were without foundation.”

In fact, he said, a letter of complaint from the Bank of Jamaica had conceded many of the accusations he made “but offered explanation”.

Golding did not elaborate on his remarks about not needing to be friendly with the central bank, but it was being interpreted as a thinly-veiled swipe at CVM Group’s owner, the Neville Blythe-controlled UGI Group, whose holdings include UGI Insurance and International Trust and Merchant Bank. Although these institutions are not directly supervised by the Bank of Jamaica they are broadly seen, even if tangentially, to be under the central bank’s influence. Blythe was not immediately available last night for comment on the issue.

Pointing to several controversies that have dogged the central bank in recent years, Golding said: “I make no apology for questioning these goings on. And I will continue to do so within any forum, from any podium and behind any microphone to which I have access.”

Later when a caller suggested that he might, for a peaceful existence, just issue an apology to the BOJ, Golding responded: “I tell you what, you give that advice to yourself.”

He also told the same caller: “…quite frankly, if the Bank of Jamaica wants to pursue this matter, then let’s meet in court and let the court decide.”

Golding told another caller that he had warned HOT 102’s management that “if you issue an apology I am going to criticise you publicly”.