As Wimbledon begins at the time of writing this article, three time Wimbledon champion Boris Becker has recently made the move from tennis pundit to international diplomat, thanks to his new found affiliation to the Central African Republic (“CAR”) as a special envoy to the EU for sports.  Becker stated in April 2018 that sport is a universal language and he wants to advance sports, culture and humanitarian affairs in Africa in his new role.

While this is a worthy ambition to harbour, the real reason for Becker’s career change quickly became apparent.  As a diplomat, Becker is arguing that he can claim immunity from the bankruptcy proceedings which were commenced against him in June 2017.  Private bankers Arbuthnot Latham & Co were the main creditor, having been owed a large undisclosed debt since 2015.  Becker, who once had an estimated personal fortune of £100million, had been blighted with a string of expensive “situations” over recent years, including divorce proceedings, paternity settlements, tax evasion, unpaid debts in Spain  and an insolvent building venture in Dubai.  This led his own barrister in his bankruptcy hearing to state “He is not a sophisticated individual when it comes to finances.”

A year on from the original proceedings, Becker is now claiming that his position as an attaché to the European Union on sporting, cultural and humanitarian affairs gives him immunity from the bankruptcy proceedings and that they therefore no longer should apply.  His legal team are claiming that Article 31 of the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations covers him and he can therefore not be subject to any legal proceeding in the UK, without consent from the Government (namely Boris Johnson as Foreign Minister) and his equivalent in CAR.  Becker has always fought against the bankruptcy saying that “a bunch of anonymous and unaccountable bankers and bureaucrats pushed me into a completely unnecessary declaration of bankruptcy which has inflicted a whole heap of damage on me”.

The Vienna Convention was drafted during the Cold War to protect diplomats to carry out their work without fear of interference from states bringing legal proceedings against them.  However, diplomatic immunity is now being used as an established tactic to avoid legal proceedings of varying natures.  Colonel Gadafi used it as have wealthy businessmen as a means of avoiding potentially expensive divorce settlements.

On closer scrutiny, there were concerns about the validity of Becker’s assertions of his new diplomatic role.  CAR’s foreign minister denied ever signing any document giving Becker official diplomatic status.   This contradicted the CAR embassy in Brussels which said it was holding his diplomatic passport there. The European Commission claimed it knew nothing of any attaché role to them. The bankruptcy was due to be discharged last week (a year on from the original declaration) and the trustees of Becker’s bankrupt estate have stated that they do not believe his claims of diplomatic immunity should have a material impact of his bankruptcy and that it is up to the court to determine whether he is correct in his application of the Vienna Convention to his personal situation. 

The court recently stayed the discharge of the bankruptcy as the creditors requested more time to pursue Becker’s assets.  They believe that Becker has not provided “full and accurate” information about his various properties and assets, including the whereabouts of various trophies which are due to be auctioned shortly.  Becker announced on the Andrew Marr show that his legal team were seeking an injunction to stop the “irreversible” auction of his memorabilia in the latest twist to his bankruptcy saga.

It is an interesting but arguably questionable legal development whereby someone with wealth, status or celebrity can engineer a diplomatic role to avoid legal proceedings.  Can it really be the case that an individual’s management (or indeed mismanagement) of their finances which causes a loss to other parties can validly be claimed to be a diplomatic issue, carried out as part of their official function?  The Convention itself offers no real guidance as to how diplomatic immunity is established and so the relevant statute in the UK is the Diplomatic Privileges Act of 1964.  It is questionable that immunity from bankruptcy promotes or protects CAR’s interests in the UK, which Becker is trying to assert.  It is clear that avoiding these proceedings are solely in Becker’s own personal interests.  Indeed, the appointment only came in April 2018 and so he is trying to retrospectively assert immunity to proceedings which started almost a year before - and which technically were complete in that he had been declared bankrupt, it was now just the discharge of the outstanding debts which was actually in play.

Will it be advantage Becker as this match of newly minted diplomat and established personal insolvency law plays out? Given that the court has recently allowed his creditors extra time to pursue assets in order to recoup more of the debts owed by Becker, it would appear that they are not yet convinced.