belize times august 11, 2013

32
Pg. 31 Pg. 31 The Belize Times The Truth Shall Make You Free Established 1957 11 AUGUST 2013 | ISSUE NO: 4857 www.belizetimes.bz | $1.00 SCAN HERE BARROW REJECTS REFORM Exploitation Averted UDP chooses POWER over GOOD GOVERNANCE Pg. 6 Pg. 7 Steven Buckley outsmarts UDP’s diabolical plan Steven Buckley and his attorney Dickie Bradley PABLO MARIN MUST RESIGN! Pg. 11 A TALE OF 2 PMs Pg. 3 $US11.5m cocaine hidden in pigtail buckets, destined to Belize CAYO YOUTH VICIOUSLY BEATEN Elon Gongora recovering at the KHMH

Upload: belize-times-press

Post on 22-Mar-2016

291 views

Category:

Documents


9 download

DESCRIPTION

Belize Times August 11, 2013

TRANSCRIPT

Page 1: Belize Times August 11, 2013

Pg. 31Pg. 31

The Belize TimesThe Truth Shall Make You Free

Established 1957

11 AUGUST 2013 | ISSUE NO: 4857 www.belizetimes.bz | $1.00

SCAN HERE

BARROW REJECTSREFORM

Pg. 4

Exploitation Averted

UDP chooses POWER over GOOD GOVERNANCE

Pg. 6

Pg. 31

Pg. 7

Steven Buckley outsmarts UDP’s diabolical plan

Steven Buckley and his attorney Dickie Bradley

PABlO MARin MUST RESiGn!

Pg. 11A TAlE Of 2 PMs Pg. 3

$US11.5m cocaine hidden in pigtail buckets,

destined to Belize

CAYO YOUTH VICIOUSlY

bEATENElon Gongora recovering

at the KHMH

Page 2: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 202

CANADIAN DOLLAR (CAD): $ 0.52

Guatemala Quetzal (GTQ): $ 3.94

Sterling Pound (GBP): $ 0.32

Euro (EUR) : $ 0.38

Eastern Caribbean (XCD):$ 1.36

Barbados (BBD): $ 1.01

United States (USD): $ 0.50

CHINESE YUAN (CNY): $ 3.10

Trinidadian (TTD) : $ 3.23

INDIAN RUPEE (INR): $ 30.71Exchange rate

of One Belize Dollar

6 Feb

LOCAL wEAThEr26 Mar 27 Mar

serving Belize since 1957 as the longest continuous newspaper.

Founder: Rt. Hon. George Cadle Price, People’s United Party Leader Emeritus

EDITOR

Alberto Vellos

LAYOUT/GRAPHIC ARTIST

Chris Williams

OFFICE ASSISTANT

Roberto Peyrefitte

Printed and Published ByThE BElIzE TImEs PREss lTD.

Tel: 671-8385#3 Queen StreetP.O. BOX 506

Belize City, BelizeEmail: [email protected]

[email protected]

14 Aug13 Aug12 Aug11 Aug10 Aug9 Aug

The Belize TimesThe Truth Shall Make You Free

Established 1957

14 APr 2013 | ISSUE NO: 4840 www.belizetimes.bz | $1.00

SCAN HERE

Barrow was forced to

compensate Buckley!

GOB AND BEL THIEVES???

Mark King is a joke

Should we drill for Oil in the Sarstoon Temash National

Park?

Stop living in the past PM Barrow

OPiniOn OUT

OUT OUT

OUT

!

!!

!

!DEAr EDITOr,I repeat, it’s a down-

right shame and disgrace what this UDP Adminis-tration is doing to Steven Buckley.

The Prime Minister is the leader of this shame and disgrace, and he showed it again in his response to Buckley’s three years of suffering.

How in the world can the Prime Minister claim he didn’t know about Buckley when the pains and strug-gles of this once hardworking man has been ventilated on the airwaves every day for many weeks and months?

Even the former Commission-er of Police had taken responsibility and promised to settle. The Minister seems to have blocked it. The Prime Minister ignored the issue.

Barrow is now trying to pretend he cares, all of a sudden, and two days after he was shamed on televi-sion, the Police moved to settle with Buckley.

This case reminds me so much of Hiriam and Captain Charlie Good. Hiriam was fired by the Ministry of Education at a time when the Minis-ter of Education, Patrick Faber, said his people must eat. This was just after the UDP won the elections in 2008. Captain Charlie Good, in de-fense of his wife, went on a hunger strike and protest outside the Su-preme Court. Prime Minister Barrow turned a blind eye, refused to right the injustice, and Captain Good died after suffering from medical compli-cations just outside the Courthouse.

Buckley could have been another Captain Good. He had to beg to eat.

DEAr EDITOr,It was a bitter sur-

prise to see Mark King back in the news after his King Gone Wild ep-isode in the Corozal Ca-

sino where he went ballistic and assaulted a police officer. I saw the video Mr. Editor, my eyes don’t lie to me.

This politician is truly a King because he even beat the Court system, something which we com-moners can’t do. The King is also a joker with his claim that he has done more for Lake Independence than Cordel has. All King has been doing in lake I ‘da wa lee tin here, and wa lee ting there’.

King has no vision. He has no real plan for Lake I. That’s why he

DEAr EDITOr,Now that Govern-

ment of Belize owns Be-lize Electricity Limited, it has been a spit on the face of us the consum-

ers. Reason: for the month of May my electricity bill soared incredibly to $161.12. For April it was $73.40, for March $65.07, for February $64. 07. Isn’t there an obvious trend here? One of outright robbery.

The mega increase of $87.72 is ridiculous and surprises me because during this period my family was away from home for an entire week. In May I was away from home for another week. While away, I thought that my absence would result in a reduction of my light bill the following month, but nothing! My June’s bill still came with a whopping $81.34.

What I am saying is that BEL has answers to give consumers. I am sure I am not the only one experienc-ing this pressure from the electricity company. This kind of exploitation, I expect from private/profit led compa-nies but not from one where the sala-ries are paid by my tax paying dollars!

Signed.Angry consumer

DEAr EDITOr,I used to have a lot

of admiration for the UDP in the House when they discussed the peo-

ple’s problems and tried to help the poor people.

But after listening to the last House meeting I am ashamed of the Prime Minister and the whole of the government side of the House. Getting personal with people’s lives and spouses is so wrong.

The member for Mesopota-mia seems to be the House clown. He has no respect for women it seems. Then because talks are be-ing held by the PUP to bring back Cordel Hyde, he started to slander the member from Fort George and Freetown telling them all kind of slanderous words. Can’t the Speak-er of the House put him in check?

Ask for the PM, it seems he wants to drag on and on about

Continued on page 29

Continued on page 29

Continued on page 29

No beggar makes an honest living. No one who doesn’t make an hon-est living can survive.

Mr. Barrow, as a human being I cannot forgive you for how you treat our poor people. It is inhumane.

Thanks to God, Buckley will fi-nally get what he deserves. God tru-ly noh like ugly.

Your day will come soon Mr. Barrow.

Signed,An angry ex-UDP voter

DEAr EDITOr,Please allow me

space in your newspa-per to share my views. Belizeans have heard

the pros and cons of drilling for oil. Firstly, we know that Oil is “Money”. Secondly, given the dire economic stance of our country, most if not all “eyes” are on how we can make money to keep the economy proper-ly revolving and, of course, to sustain the burdensome debts accumulated over the years. The recent reports I have went through indicate that oil is in “expected” commercial quantity in the Sarstoon Temash National Park. So the question is: Should we Drill?

SATIIM, the organization respon-sible for co-managing the Sarastoon Temash National Park is ensuring that, and I quote from the official website: “to safeguard the ecologi-cal integrity of the Sarstoon-Temash region and employ its resources in an environmentally sound manner for the economic, social, cultural, and spiritual well-being of its indige-nous people”. Greg Choc, who is the Founding Executive Director, has a

Page 3: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 3

Mass Cruise Tourism dangerous for Southern Belize

UDP Ignores Warning Signs

03

Francis Fonseca

Continued on page 10

A TAlE Of 2 PMS

Belize City, August 8, 2013Aside from the fact that it was the same

old UDP circus equipped with animals and clowns alike that rolled in for Wednesday’s House Meeting, the occasion offered the public an opportunity to draw a comparison between the current and former Prime Min-ister of Belize.

Unlike the arrogant, disrespectful, vile and hateful behavior of Dean Barrow, Said Musa appeared statesmanlike, humble, honorable and respectful despite the moles-tation from Dean’s pets on the other side.

Dean grandstands. He loves the lime-light and cannot help but look up at the camera each time he is about the spew off a slew of mumbo jumbo that no one else can understand. His inability to speak in layman’s terms makes him feel superior intellectually, but more importantly, it shows that he lacks the common touch, a trait fully embodied by Said Musa. Barrow is indeed all about personality.

A key difference that many Belizeans may have missed at Wednesday’s House meeting is the difference in their style of governance. Musa, as Prime Minister, may have signed an agreement with the Ashcroft alliance, but the fact that he signed a docu-ment in black and white is, in and of itself, a difference between Musa and Barrow.

You see, Dean Barrow, the brilliant at-torney that he is, does not sign anything in black and white. Just as an example, check out the rosewood scandal, in which one of Barrow’s chief financiers, German Ignacio Vega, was allowed to keep 97% of the pro-ceeds of sale while only 3% went into gov-ernment coffers. There was no paper trail. Barrow is smarter than that. He attacks Said Musa for not taking the agreement with Ashcroft to the House, but did Barrow take the rosewood scheme to the House?

Another instance in which there is no paper trail is Barrow’s gifting of bloated legal contracts to his wife, brother and daughter. Despite many attempts to find out how many millions of dollars they have received, Barrow has kept their earnings in complete darkness. No black and white. No answers. No motion in the House.

Even today, the Government is negoti-ating in secret with Norwegian Cruise Lines over the unpopular cruise tourism in South-ern Belize.

On Wednesday, it was clear to be seen that Barrow is living in a bubble. He curses Musa for signing agreements, when he doesn’t even put his secret agreements in black and white.

In all these instances, the difference between the two men is glaring. By his secret deals, Barrow feeds those close to him with wealth untold, while Musa did not receive any personal gain or benefits from the agreement he signed with the Ashcroft alliance.

Barrow must go to sleep at night think-ing that he is just the greatest thing since slice bread, by concocting such a hair-brained scheme of not putting anything in writing. If its one thing that you said on Wednesday that is true Dean Barrow, it is that you could never compare to the leadership and vision of Said Musa. Belizean people may be quiet right now Dean, but trust me, they are not asleep.

Belize City, August 7, 2013THE Prime Minister of

Belize likes to play Brer An-ansi by pretending to know nothing about anything. This way, he assumes, he cannot be caught lying, but he often is.

On the other hand, his Minister of Labour and Im-migration, who is also known as “Sabe lo todo” because he thinks that he knows every-thing about everything, has been appointed the Cabinet’s

point man to negotiate a deal that will allow Norwe-gian Cruise Line to bring thousands of passengers into the “forbidden” wa-ters of Belize.

“Sabe lo todo”, who is an auto mechanic, who re-cently also elevated him-self to that of Engineer, also boasts of himself as a businessman, rice farm-er and sugar exporter. He is also an immigration ex- One of the BTB Reports containing warn-

ings against mass tourism in the South

Page 4: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 4

Officer Down!

04

PUP - A Reform Agenda

on the

By Francis w. FonsecaThe People’s United Party of

2013 is deeply committed to Re-form. We recognize fully that the Belizean people are demanding that Belize is governed in a more accountable and responsible manner.

The Belizean people do not expect their political leaders to be perfect but they do expect us to recognize that we are ser-vants of the people and that each day we are honored with the responsibility of public ser-vice, we work hard on resolving the many serious challenges

facing our nation.It was in this spirit

that the PUP through the Chairman of the Public Accounts Com-mittee, Hon. Julius Es-pat, tabled a Motion in the House of Rep-resentatives this past Wednesday, to reform the structure of the Pub-lic Accounts Committee (PAC).

The Belizean people are justifiably concerned that political leaders, past and present, have

not done an effec-tive job of accounting for the use of public funds. The PAC has direct responsibility for providing oversight of public funds but its current structure of 2 PUP Members and 4 UDP members has rendered it non-func-tional.

The last PUP ad-ministration had al-

lowed for the Chair-man of the PAC to be an opposition member but this has clearly not served to resolve the political stagnation which has overtaken the com-mittee.

The new PUP Proposal for Reform will lead to a restruc-tured PAC made up of 2 PUP Members, 2 UDP Members, 1 Senator representing the Business Com-munity, 1 Senator rep-resenting the Unions, and 1 Senator repre-senting the Churches.

This new struc-ture, we believe, has the potential to lead to greater and more meaningful oversight and accountability of public funds.

The PUP has

called on the UDP Government to work with us to implement this reform measure and to improve upon it if necessary.

We call upon all Belizeans, partic-ularly our unions, churches, and busi-ness community, to give their full sup-port to this initia-tive and to join us in calling upon the Government to get serious about the reforms the Beliz-ean people are de-manding.

As Hon. Julius Espat said, the PUP Reform Agenda will not go away. We will keep bringing it to the National As-sembly and to the people of Belize. The work continues…

Page 5: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 5

Amandala & UDP Propaganda

05

EDiTORiAl

Dean Barrow is the Minister of Finance. He does as he pleases with the taxpayers monies. He has personally approved millions of dollars from Government funds to his ex-wife Lois Young Barrow. Millions have been paid to Lois Young Barrow’s law firm where Dean Barrow’s daughter also worked. Most of these monies could have

been saved as the “work” done by Lois could have and should have been done by the Solicitor General and her team of attorneys. What Dean Barrow has done is rank nepotism and cronyism of the worst sort. He has been enriching his family.

Lois Young Barrow is now an Ambassador living high off the hog at taxpayer’s expense, receiving free medical and other benefits.

As Minister of Finance, Dean Barrow has been approving large sums of taxpayer’s dollars to his brother, Denys Barrow, for legal work the government lawyers can do and by law should be doing. It is not yet known if brother Denys has reached two or three million but for certain the millions will be many by the time Dean Barrow is kicked out of office at the next election and answers for his offences.

What Dean Barrow is doing is enriching his brother in the most shameful manner, from scarce taxpayer’s dollars, monies that are badly needed to help students at a time of rising tuition fees and other sec-ondary and tertiary education costs.

Dean Barrow, as Prime Minister, appointed the most unsuitable person to be Belize’s so-called Music Ambassador. His son, one Moses Levi a.k.a. Shyne a.k.a. Jamal. This misfit is a convicted criminal who spent eight years in an American jail before being forced onto Belize through deportation. He lives in Israel at a huge cost to the taxpayers of Belize. The Supreme Court recently found him guilty of running up a huge rental bill in Belize and refusing to pay. Under Belize’s laws any public official, Ambassador or Minister, who does such a thing must resign. The exception is of course “Shyne” Barrow.

Dean Barrow as Minister of Finance removed the boledo and lot-tery from government control where it has been from the 1940s and handed it over to UDP crony “Brads”. The allegation is that Barrow’s son, Anwar, is a silent partner with Brads. This is a serious allegation and requires the Prime Minister to inform the nation whether it is so or not. Such a revelation is the minimum from a government which pledged accountability and transparency. The Boledo and Lottery is a multi-million dollars cash cow. It should be managed by a government agency and all profits should go to social programs.

Dean Barrow as Minister of Finance has been presiding over a most corrupt administration. Hustling is the name of the game. The list is too long to recount in details here. Human trafficking of Chinese and Indian nationals through Belize to the USA. They are facilitated with visas approved through the Immigration Department to a secret list of UDP cronies and given a monthly quota of visa approvals.

The medical services has a multi-million dollar budget for medicines. This budget is a grab-tub for UDP hustlers. Top officials in the Ministry of Health are guilty of using tax payers’ funds to buy substandard phar-maceuticals which are re-sold to the Ministry at lucrative prices. It is called racketeering. As the CEO in the Ministry of Health, Peter Allen should tell the nation who is the “secret” owner of the company supplying these meds.

Belize is now considered a major drug transit country. Methamphet-amine and pseudo-ephedrine have been pouring into the country through Customs by container loads, destined for Mexico and then the USA. Drug planes and drug smugglers closely linked to the UDP have been at their busiest levels. One of the UDP financiers, inside the Deputy Prime Minister’s special political circle, was arrested by the DEA. Another major

UDP supporter/financier is now in a Mexican jail for drug trafficking. This week another drug scandal broke out involving a businessman connected to administration of the Corozal Free Zone, which is led by no other than the Deputy Prime Minister’s relative, Raul Rosado.

The corruption at the Ministry of Lands is legend. Even a harmless matter like rosewood has been a huge hustling commodity for UDP cronies and UDP ministers with the full blessing of Dean Barrow, Prime Minister and Minister of Finance.

Dean Barrow as Prime Minister was heard offering a lame explanation as to how his nephew Kimano Barrow, a computer technician, was gifted with thousands of acres of land for oil exploration.

A once-humble lad from Port Loyola is now the proud owner of dozens of two and three story mansions, since becoming a Dean Barrow Minister. So has a larger-than-life UDP Senator.

No explanation has been offered as to how the Prime Minister’s current wife can accept hundreds of thousands of dollars belonging to taxpayers for approved government projects, as donation to a private fund raising. Was he not the one who launched a criminal prosecution against the former Prime Minister who paid a medical loan with funds donated for another project? Has Dean Barrow, the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance lost his moral compass?

In all this hustling and corruption, Belizeans have been getting poorer. Life has gotten harder, much harder.

And where is the leading newspaper, the Amandala, in all of this? Busy editorializing and attacking the former Prime Minister. There have twenty-nine attack editorials against Rt. Hon. Said Musa. There is not one editorial against Prime Minister Dean Barrow. The record speaks for itself. Said Musa has not been in government for almost five years. Yet he continues to be the target of vicious Amandala attacks. Barrow is given a free pass. In fact, Barrow has been crowned a hero and a nationalist by his new found apologists and collaborators.

When the “nationalist” Barrow parceled out millions of tax dollars to his party standard bearers, the Amandala saw no wrong doing and wrote no editorial. When the nationalist padded the voters list in 2012 with thousands of alien voters, an admiring Amandala editorial explained it as part of a world-wide phenomenon of migration. As little babies kept dy-ing in the Orange Walk, Toledo and then Belize City hospitals, Amandala editorialized about pro-poor health services. Not a word of condemnation.

As the editorials increasingly turn against Hon. Francis Fonseca we question the Amandala’s motive. We question also, the absolute absence of a single Editorial or From the Publisher that has offered an explanation on Mark Espat and Cordel Hyde.

Why? We ask, would Dean Barrow, days after the 2012 general elections appoint Mark Espat a special Ambassador and Cordel Hyde a diplomatic Ambassador.

How? We ask, could a large political rodent and Belize’s worst political traitor not receive some mention in the largest newspaper? True there was an editorial to explain that the PUP lost the 2012 elections by two seats, but there has been no analysis of the real reasons because they would have to talk about Albert and Lake Independence. There has been no mention of Mark Espat’s history of sabotaging the PUP and selling out his constituency and in the process selling out the poor people of this country.

It is now August 2013, five and a half years after Said Musa lost the general elections. It is a convenient distraction to attack Musa while Bar-row enriches his family and his government keeps the poor in a state of perennial poverty. The X has become a major player in Barrow’s game.

Amandala, the newspaper, the TV and the radio are awash in govern-ment and government related advertisements, commercials and full page UDP propaganda. The people might be poor but they are not blind, Jack.

Power to the people.

Page 6: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 606

No apologies for 13 dead babies!

Belize City, August 7, 2013Even after suffering through the

pain of being disfigured, disabled, incapacitated and forced to beg on the street sides of Belize City for the last three years, Steven Buckley, has had to continue fighting off the cruelty of the Barrow Administra-tion.

On Monday of this week Steven Buckley was being lured into an ambush, similar to the one he faced three years ago on April 2010 when a Police Officer opened fire at him and his work colleagues for no reason. This time, doing the firing were officials of the Government who had called Buckley earlier that day to ask him to attend a meeting with the Police Commissioner at the Raccoon Police Station.

There was an evil plot in the making. Buckley was instructed not to bring any attorney and to show up at 10:00am. But Buckley is a wise man, and having already endured more than enough pain, he refused to be tricked any more. Buckley waited outside the police station compound until his attorney

Exploitation AvertedSteven Buckley outsmarts UDP’s diabolical plan

Dickie Bradley arrived and walked with him into the station.

After 30 minutes of negotia-tion, Buckley appeared alongside Bradley. There was good news after 40 months of injustice.

Commissioner Allen Whylie had accepted responsibility. Also present at the meeting were the Acting Solicitor General Nigel Hawke and Senior Counsel Trienia Young who reported that the Government did not wish to go through the Court to settle the matter and were prepared to commence negotiations towards a final settlement.

The BELIZE TIMES under-stands that the Government agents, once having lured Buckley to the meeting, had been instructed to offer a mea-sly settlement of $100,000. But the presence of attorney Dickie Bradley flummoxed the agents. Buckley would have none of it either and when asked what amount he expected, he stated “TWO MILLION DOLLARS”.

Our checks with various

civil law attorneys have confirmed that Buckley was on target. The Court would factor in a number of things including Buckley’s medical bills, loss of employment, loss of enjoyment, pain and suffering, and abridged life expectancy as part of the full legal compensation. All of this would amount to several millions.

The Government’s agents were not able to commit to a final settle-ment, but agreed, at least, to pay a sum this week as a partial payment towards what will be a final settle-ment. Until then, negotia-tions will continue towards this end.

Buckley’s waiting has been long and painful, yet even when there is a sliver of hope that justice can be served, the Barrow Admin-istration plots how to take advantage of the poor and suffering.

Buckley resorted to begging on the street side as the injuries left him disabled and

unable to work (Pic Courtesy Channel 5)

Page 7: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 7 07

Hush Amandala, Hush

BARROW REJECTS REFORMUDP chooses POWER over GOOD GOVERNANCE

Belize City, August 8, 2013Wednesday’s special sitting

of the House of Representa-tives turned out to be a sad dis-appointment for Belizeans. An opportunity to deal soberly with the real business of the people got flushed down by Prime Min-ister Dean Barrow who opted for political grandstanding, personal attacks and creating smoke and mirrors over a recent Caribbean Court of Justice ruling.

The special sitting was of particular interest to Belizeans because it presented an oppor-tunity to introduce an important reform mechanism through a motion for the establishment of a Joint Public Accounts Commit-tee that would fix a broken sec-tion of our system democracy.

Currently, the Public Ac-counts Committee (PAC) plays a key role as an oversight body, monitoring an examining Gov-ernment’s use of public funds. In paper, the Committee looks like a promising layer of check and balance, but in practice it is a different story. The ruling party in Government has majority mem-bers with four Ministers hold-

ing seats, over two Opposition members. This political control has stymied the work of PAC and handicapped its oversight role, reducing its impact to that of just another rubber stamp body with no powers at all.

The historic motion intro-duced on Wednesday by the Op-position PUP sought to make PAC a meaningful, working oversight body. The formula was simple: lessen the partisan control. The Joint PAC would have achieved this by giving both political parties equal say with 2 members each and expanding the membership to include the Senators represent-ing the Chamber of Commerce, the Unions and the Churches.

The Chamber of Commerce, which is the largest the private sector group in Belize, examined the proposal and gave their full approval. Sensing the political climate and assuming that the Government would have opt-ed to play political games, the Chamber appealed for “the Government and the Opposi-tion [to] work together”.

But as much as PUP Leader Hon. Francis Fonseca and Depu-

ty Leader Hon. Julius Espat, the current Chairman of PAC, called for reasoned thinking, the UDP went berserk and torpedoed the motion.

Prime Minister Dean Bar-row rejected the idea of reform. This man who reigns with a tight fist and who has become drunk with power over the past five years fears losing any kind of power. This was clear for all to see as the Prime Minister came up with all sorts of rea-sons for the motion not to be introduced in the National As-sembly. He said it was “mis-conceived”, filled with “proce-dural errors”, “out of order” and “without merit”.

PM Barrow even chided the Chamber of Commerce, accus-ing them of not doing “their homework” and “blindly” sup-porting the motion.

The Prime Minister was at his best political theatrics. He cared not if the purpose of mo-tion was rational and necessary. He cared not that the Opposi-tion and most Belizeans want real transparency, accountability and good governance, and just

the imagination of it.Barrow appears to be

afraid of oversight. What does he have to hide? Is he afraid to explain to the people of Be-lize why the Government paid one million dollars to Barrow & Company and Lois Young Bar-row & Co, which are owned by the Prime Minister’s brother Denys and ex-wife, Lois.

Is Barrow afraid of serious scrutiny over Government’s plan for BTL, which has turned out to be Belize’s biggest liabil-ity, even larger than the Super-bond, with over $500 millions of dollars owed to the previous owners in compensation and legal awards?

Is the UDP fearful of having to account for the spending of millions in public funds for their election political gimmicks?

While Barrow has been able to dodge reform, PAC Chairman Hon. Espat has com-mitted to not giving up. The real judges, however, are the people of Belize who must see past Barrow’s performances and decide when the games he plays will end.

Opposition members stood united and strong against Barrow’s theatrics

Opposition Leader Hon. Francis Fonseca chastised Barrow for

failing to support the reform measure

Page 8: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 808

– Freetown’s Mr. Quitar?

City of Belmopan, August 2, 2013In previous editions the BELIZE TIMES

had warned Belizeans about the UDP’s suspi-cious excitement over the US Personal Identi-fication Registration System (PIRS). This PIRS is a system of immigration and national se-curity control. It features readable passports or travel documents by finger printing, pho-tographing and scanning persons at ports of entry.

PROOf THAT YOU ARE bEING

SPIED ON!

Belize is now finding out in world news, due to former tech-nical contractor for the United States National Security Agency (NSA) and former employee of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Edward Snowden, about the dirty details of their National Security Agency’s (NSA) spy operations. In top-secret materials leaked by Snowden, the National Security Agency discloses that the pro-gram, called “XKeyscore”, is its “widest-reaching” system for de-veloping intelligence from the In-ternet.

“I, sitting at my desk,” said Snowden, “could wiretap any-one…”

This top secret NSA program allows analysts to search with no prior authorization through vast databases containing emails, on-line chats (messenger and video) and the browsing histories of mil-lions of individuals.

Now in the image (Image 1.1) accompanying this article you will notice that Belize is covered by a big blob of red. Those red dots are indicating that the XKeyscore pro-gram is present in that country or region.

Belizeans will remember that in August 2010 the UDP passed the Interception of Telecommu-nications Act, which put the tele-communication providers and regular citizens into a tailspin. We were forced to register our phones and the “whys” of the process was shrouded in cryptic language.

We also note that in their new contract under Terms and Con-ditions (see attached Image 1.2), Belize Telemedia Limited (BTL) says explicitly “…voice and data communication transmitted over the wireless network may not be completely private”.

Where is Minister of Telecom-munications, Joy Grant? Where is the Minister of National Security, John Saldivar? Where is the Attor-ney General, Wilfred Elrington? Shouldn’t he be legally advising the country on this? Where is

John Avery, head of the PUC? Where is the know-it-all Prime Minister, Dean Barrow?

Why are all of them si-lent? Will they just sit back and not tell us what is go-ing on? Barrow spoke big to Obama a few months ago, now he hides and hopes Be-lizeans don’t find out the truth.

The big question is not whether they are but to what extent are these desperate, corrupt and immoral UDPs using and abusing all these

things to spy on their political and personal enemies?

Recently on Facebook, a high ranking, former SIS agent UDP told a civilian that he “knew” that he had post-ed a comment and that he could tell him from which PC he had done it and from what IP address.

This is a peeping Tom UDP government and cit-izens are now aware. The BELIZE TIMES demands an-swers.

PUP NOTICEBelize Rural South Constituency Committee

The People’s United Party is accepting applications for mem-bers of the Belize Rural South Constituency Committee.

Application forms are available at the San Pedro PUP office or the PUP Secretariat, Independence Hall, #3 Queen Street, Belize City.

Application must be filled and returned to the Secretariat, ad-dressed to the Secretary General by Friday August 30, 2013.

PUP NOTICEPickstock Constituency Committee

The People’s United Party is accepting appli-cations for members of the Pickstock Con-

stituency Committee.Application forms are available at the PUP Secretariat, Independence Hall, #3 Queen

Street, Belize City.

Application must be filled and returned to the Sec-retariat, addressed to the Secretary General by

Friday August 23, 2013.

The red dots show the countries where the spy programme is active. Belize is included.

Page 9: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 9

The Amandala/Barrow Affair

09

PUBLIC AUCTION SALE

BY ORDER OF THE MORTGAGEE HOLY REDEEMER CREDIT UNION LIMITED, a Licensed Public Auctioneer will sell on site the following property at the time as listed.

At Guadalupe Street, Sarteneja Village, Corozal District on Saturday, 10th August 2013 at 2:00 pm

ALL THAT piece or parcel or lot of land situate at Guadalupe Street in the Village of Sarteneja, Corozal District, Belize, being Lot No. 151B (now Parcel 454, Block 3, Sarteneja Registration Section) comprising 490.373 square metres as shown and described on a Plan drawn by Licensed Surveyor L.S. Tingling dated the 12th day of June 2000 and being lodged and recorded at the Lands & Sur-veys Department in Belmopan in Register No. 15 Entry No. 5129 TOGETHER with all buildings and erections standing and being thereon, the freehold property of MINERVA CANUL FLORES

DATED this 31st day of July 2013

All sales are strictly cash and deemed final. For more information contact:

HOLY REDEEMER CREDIT UNION LIMITED1 HYDE’S LANE, BELIZE CITY, BELIZE

Phone: (501) 224-5644Fax: (501) 223-0738

For SaleBy Order of the

Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd., a company duly regis-tered under the Companies Act, Chapter 250 of the Laws of Belize, Revised Edition, 2000, and hav-ing its registered office at Cor. Albert and Bishop Streets, Belize City, Belize, hereby gives notice of its intention to exercise its power of sale as Mort-gagee under a Deed of Mortgage made the 29th day of December, 2009, between PASTOR REYES (also known as JUSTO PASTOR REYES) of Sarawee Village, Stann Creek District, Belize of the one part, and Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd., of the other part, and recorded at the Land Titles Unit in the Deeds Book Vol. 1 of 2010 at Folios 263–292, the said Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd. will at the expi-ration of two months from the date of the first pub-lication of this notice sell the property described in the schedule hereto.

All offers to purchase the said property must be made in writing and full particulars and conditions of sale may be obtained from the said Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd.

SCHEDULE

ALL THOSE pieces or parcels of land being Lots Nos. 163 and 164 comprising 404.550 S.M. each situate in Sarawee Village, Stann Creek District, bounded and described as shown by Plan No. 24 of 1995 dated 23rd day of March, 1995 attached to Minister’s Fiat Grant No. 24 of 1995 TOGETH-ER with all buildings and erections standing and being thereon.

DATED this 5th day of August, 2013.MUSA & BALDErAMOS

91 North Front StreetBelize City

Attorney-at-Law forScotiabank (Belize) Ltd.

Barrow Rejects Amandala’s “Noisy Nationalism”

Belize City, August 7, 2013By now most Belizeans have real-

ized that there is a special relationship between the Amandala newspaper and the Barrow Administration.

The government of Dean Barrow fills up the Amandala with dozens of paid ads every week, and in return the Amandala glorifies the leadership of Prime Minister Dean Barrow through craftily written articles and editorials.

This strictly for-profit relationship was most obvious to everyone when in the bulky 72-page issue for Sunday August 4, 2013, in an editorial fittingly entitled “Personality and philosophy”, Amandala sought to do the impossi-ble and recreate Barrow’s personality and philosophy.

According to the Amandala, Bar-row, whose administration has been rocked by corruption, incompetence and scandals, is a nationalist.

Of course, the Amandala couldn’t explain why they think Barrow is a na-tionalist. His actions surely don’t make him one. His takeover of BTL and BEL were personal – all about his fight with Ashcroft and FORTIS. If the takeovers

were for Belize, then why has the BTL takeover cost Belize millions more in legal expenses while only Barrow’s family, the choice attorneys, end up making money. As to BEL, the com-pany is now broke and lights bills for consumers skyrocketed after a 17% increase.

The Amandala can try to brush up Barrow’s image as much as they want, but they can’t hide the truth. Barrow is absolutely, totally only about himself.

While Amandala pleases Barrow, what does Barrow think of himself? The BELIZE TIMES has obtained a Wikileaks cable with details of an interesting meeting held between Barrow and the U.S. Ambassador, in which Barrow laid out his true per-sonality and philosophy. He said he doesn’t believe in “noisy national-ism” and he dissed the late Venezue-lan President Hugo Chavez, calling his plan “hegemonic aspirations”.

This is an excerpt of the Wikileaks Cable: “regarding Venezuela, Bar-row said that, while not keen on Chavez’s “hegemonic aspirations”

Continued on page 20

Page 10: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 10

VEGAS COME UP AGAIN!

Espats will join UDP ranksIMAGINE THE DESPERATION

Lee Mark Chang

What do you think the govern-ment should do with all the va-cant houses at Fresh Pond that the UDP cronies are fighting over?

Jose

Gilbert

bernadine

Martin

tisha

bensford

ted

Joe

The UDP are users, even the PUP have done bad in the past according to the people. Cost of living is high right now so I believe it’s nonsense, because not only their people (the UDP) live in Belize and I’d appreciate one of those houses myself as a struggling single parent.

They should give it to the people who need it the most. Do a survey and see which individuals are really in need of the houses.

I believe that they should give the houses to poor people and hardworking Belizeans like myself, and I see no reason why I’m not entitled to one as well.

They should give the people who really need it; the ones that have don’t worry about them. I rent, I’m a well-aged man and I work hard in the hot sun to make ends meet.

Give it to the single mothers or single parents on a whole; do a survey and develop a plan for those houses because as a hard working woman I expect no handouts.

Find people that need the houses; and it’s pitiful to fight amongst each other; if your united then stay united if they fight among each other how can they come as one to govern and develop this country.

Stop greedy up everything and give the real poor people the houses, because there are other people who are really in need of them.

Give the people who need it.

FACES & OPINIONS

by MICAH Vernon

Continued from page 3

Mass Cruise Tourism dangerous for Southern Belize

UDP Ignores Warning Signs

pert.The latter two he does not pontificate

much about because his sugar exports are not to the traditional markets and the sale-of-passports business is, perhaps, a bit too unsavory for a MINISTER of government and for one who in his past life lived by high ideals and principle. Well, not quite, if you check the records.

“Sabe”, in discussing the proposed deal with Norwegian, based on a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between them and the government said: “The agreement has to bring revenue to the government and there is no shame in that and gov-ernment has to make revenue because there is cost”.

Why state the obvious? What we want to know is why the government is ignoring the advice of the experts by persisting to allow NCL to develop a massive cruise ship facility in the south. Nothing else is rele-vant. Kill the deal!

But that is vintage “Sabe”. With all his outrageous ramblings to underscore his “expert credentials”, he appears to be pumped-up with jackass steroids.

Neither did he, nor his boss, nor his colleagues in the Cabinet read the memo from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB): NO MASS TOURISM IN THE SOUTH.

The recently published IDB Sustainable Tourism Development Plan which was paid for by the Government of Belize is abso-lutely specific about mass tourism in the southern waters of Belize, including the barrier reef. It recommends ONLY POCKET tourism for ships with no more than 250 passengers.

It notes, among other numerous ob-servations that “the tendency of visitors to converge at a few popular sites during the short high season has led to concerns about the capacity of existing destinations for accommodating demand without dam-aging the quality of the visitor experience and associated natural and cultural heri-tage”.

What’s so difficult about that to under-stand and why is the government ignoring these recommendations?

The government and the minister who is dealing with NCL has chosen to ignore these recommendations. We are positive that NCL must have seen the Plan. If they had any integrity and respect for the people of this country, the decent thing to do is to back off. No environmental impact assess-ment, no matter how falsified could come up with any mitigation measure to prevent the massive damage to the reef system and the related environment.

The IDB Report is not the only one to caution against mass tourism in the southern coastal waters of Belize as is the case where NCL plans to bring 3 to 4 thousand visitors to the area on a weekly basis.

There are other similar studies and re-ports that state that mass tourism in the south will not be the best thing for the tourist industry in Belize in the long term.

An article published in Science Digest of 13 April 2010 by Amy Diedrich of the De-partment of Marine Affairs, University of Rhode Island states: “The fact that Belize is attracting the high-yield upscale tour-

ist means it does not need to resort to attracting mass tourists, who tends to spend less, are less culturally sensi-tive….and which often see much of the wealth escaping back to non-resident owners.”

Another study, this one by the Center for Responsible Travel (CREST), with the support of the Belize Tourist Board (BTB) and the Protected Areas Conservation Trust (PACT), came to a similar conclusion.

CREST notes that the cruise line busi-ness is not as beneficial as stay-over tour-ism. It also reprimands the Government of Belize and the BTB by observing that “Pol-icies such as number of passengers per-mitted to disembark per day are waived in order to aide cruise tourism, often to the detriment of ecological and archae-ological attractions.”

So why will this be any different with NCL?

CREST advises that preservation of Belize’s international tourism reputation is important to preserve the critical stay-over market.

The Center on EcoTourism and Sus-tainable Development also warned that Belize should “prohibit cruise tourism in pristine and valuable eco-systems and cultural sites” because “the cost of opening or damaging these areas sim-ply do not justify the limited benefits”.

It notes, among other numerous ob-servations that “the tendency of visitors to converge at a few popular sites during the short high season has led to concerns about the capacity of existing destinations for accommodating demand without dam-aging the quality of the visitor experience and associated natural and cultural heri-tage”.

In a recent report by a journalist, Ross Klein, he describes the cruise ship industry as “The ‘All-inclusive Illusion”. He states that the industry is neither environmental-ly nor socially sustainable.

There are many similar reports cau-tioning about mass tourism in Belize and for the protection of the sensitive ecological and cultural environments of southern Belize.

The talk of jobs, but not the type of jobs, is also a political illusion to bait the people of this area, who will remain bet-ter off now that after cruise tourism has destroyed their environment and their traditional means of livelihood.

The people in the Ministry of Tour-ism and the Belize Tourist Board know this. It is therefore incomprehensible that they should have gone in front of the cameras to talk nonsense.

While “Sabe” continues to mouth off about his being a businessman who knows a good business deal, he must pay attention to the numbers. Belize has one of the lowest head tax per cruise ship visitor in the region at US$3.50-$5.00. In Jamaica the head tax is US$15.00, in Bermuda it is as high as US$60.00, even higher than Alaska’s US$40.00.

What will the nation and people be paying for after you and your government come down from your jackass steroids high?

Page 11: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 11

Drug Container busted in El Salvador was for Free Zone Company

$US11.5m cocaine hidden in pigtail buckets, destined to Belize

Belize City, August 6, 2013Samer Akil Rada, a former

Director/Businessman in the Corozal Free Zone, is being sought for questioning by the Police af-ter a container truck transporting goods for his free zone business, CargoYo, was intercepted in El Salvador and found carrying drugs on July 19th, almost three weeks ago.

It has been reported that his business was searched by Be-lize’s anti-drug unit last week Fri-day, but reportedly nothing incrim-inating was found. Akil Rada, who resides in Chetumal, Quintana Roo, Mexico has not been seen at his business for several weeks but has given interviews to media in Chetumal, denying that he is in-volved in any illegal trade.

The refrigerated container truck was stopped at a check-point in the municipality of San Martin, in the outskirts of El Sal-vador. Drug sniffing dogs alerted El Salvador’s Police of suspicious activity and the Police ordered the truck driver, Nicaraguan national Juan José Matamoros Girón, to another location where the truck was searched thoroughly.

The truck with Costa Rican li-cense plates transported over 400 plastic buckets, the kind known in Belize as “pigtail buckets”. The buckets contained frozen pineap-ple and orange juice, but inside 48 of them, authorities also found parcels of cocaine wrapped inside plastic bags.

The drugs weighed 460 kilos, at Police officials have reported its value at US$11.5 million.

It has been discovered that

the truck intercepted in El Salvador was one of two that were headed to the free zone, in the name of Akil Rada’s company. The second container arrived all the way in Belize on July 21st and the BELIZE TIMES understands that when it was searched by Belize officials, they reported finding only

buckets of frozen pineapple and or-ange juice valued at $65,399.

Little is known about the business-man Samer Akil Rada, apart from his ownership of Car-goYo, a transporta-tion company in the Corozal Free Zone. He is also connected to several compa-nies including Grupo Sol and Sol Fashions, which are registered in Corozal and have business ties in Co-lombia, Venezuela

and Panama.In 2010, Akil Rada rose to prom-

inence when he was elected to the Board of Directors of the Corozal Free Zone under the administration of UDP Corozal South East caretaker Raul Rosado who is the Free Zone Chief Executive Officer. Rosado is a relative of Deputy Prime Minister Gaspar Vega. In 2012, Akil Rada’s bid for a second term failed.

Of interest are reports that the Chairman of the Free Zone David Aki-erman, who served in the Free Zone administration along with Akil Rada, denied knowing which individual was behind the company to whom the container trucks were transport-ing goods for, when he was asked by media representatives last week. This eye-brow raising denial begs the question whether Akierman, who has served as the CFZ Chairman under the entire UDP Government’s term, has things to hide.

The Corozal Free Zone has been named in annual reports by the Unit-ed States as a hub for money laun-dering and drug trafficking.

El Salvador Police officials guard confiscated drugs

The cocaine pack-ages were inside the

pigtail buckets

CFZ companies linked to Akil Rada

Akil Rada (in red circle) along with CFZ Board members. Far left: UDP Corozal South East care-

taker Raul Rosado

Page 12: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 12

Page 13: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 13

2013 REina dE La Costa Maya

13TOPMODELTHE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013

Etana

DEstinEE arnolD

NEWSEntERtainMEnt

HoLLywood staR in BELizE

Destinee Arnold, rep-resenting Belize, won the 2013 International La Riena de La Costa Maya pageant held in San Pe-dro, Ambergris Caye on Friday August 2nd.

Destinee graced the stage with poise and beauty, and captured the heart of the audience as well as that of the panel of judges to be named the winner.

As part of the cultural presentation, Destinee displayed a costume de-picting the hard working Maya women of Belize that included a blue out-fit with jewelry and a headpiece adorned with pottery, symbolizing the contribution wom-en made to the artifacts found in ruins across the Mundo Maya Region.

Congratulations Des-tinee!

visit us at www.belizetimes.bz or Facebook/ Belize Times

Loca

tion:

Rad

isson

Fort

Geor

ge H

otel

and

Mar

ina

• Height: 5’ 10”• Career Plan: Dentist• Sign: Libra• Favourite Food: Pasta• Likes: Softball, Pageants, Modeling, Dancing

• Lives in Belize City• Fav. Quote: “Creativity is inventing, exper-

imenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes, and having fun.” – Mary Lou Cook.

TOP MODEL Clothing and Accessories provided by

CATWALK FASHIONSCor. North Front Steet & Queen Street

Belize City

Follow us on facebook

Idolly

Page 14: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 14

win Interoffice volleyball playoffs

Cayo 1st Division football champs

Telemedia & Belize Bank

14 SPORTS THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013

Lennox Castillo defends against Matthew Leal

San Martin wins

Sunrise crushes Village Gyals in Belize

Rural softball

Belmopan, August 4, 2013The San Martin Aguilas won

the Cayo 1st Division football championship at the FFB Stadium in Belmopan on Sunday afternoon, bombing Roaring Cree: 2-0 in the

Giovanni Lopez scored San Martin’s 1st goal

2nd half.The best efforts of San Martin’s

strikers, Giovanni Lopez and Henry Nino Gomez and midfielders San-tiago Cruz, Carlos Tzalam Bandido Gutierrez and Nicolas Caliz did not

impress the Roaring Creek’sdefenders and goalie Jose Man-

gar handled all other challenges for a scoreless 1st half.

In the 2nd half, Roaring Creek’s Ajani Banner fired a left foot shot at goal, but only served to make the San Martin goalie look good.

San Martin’s Giovanni Lopez responded with a shot on goal but Roaring Creek’s Jose Mangar handled the challenge. But when the Roaring Creek defenders tried to clear the ball out of goal, they gifted the ball back to Giovanni Lopez fired right back at goal, and Mangar never had a prayer of stopping the shot.

The next Roaring Creek press forced San Martin’s goalie to put his body on the line, and the resulting tension caused a Roaring Creek player to start a fight on the field. The refer-ee chilled the situation with red cards for the Roaring Creek and San Martin players who displayed unsportsman-like conduct.

When the dust settled, the game resume and San Martin’s Santiago Cruz got off a shot at goal that Man-gar managed to deflect to Henry Go-mez, who beat the last defender and fired back a shot to the back of the net to give San Martinez the title, even though the Aguilas finished with only 9 men on the field as Giovanni Lopez also got sent off with a late red card.

FFB program coordinator Cruz Gamez presented team trophies to the champs, 2nd place: Roaring Creek and 3rd place: Cotton Tree. San Mar-tin’s Robert Sutherland won the Most Valuable Player award, while

San Martin goalie Marco Hernan-dez won Best Goalkeeper and Roar-ing Creek’s Darrel Myvett won Most Goals award.

Belize City, August 1, 2013Belize Telemedia’s Digicel

4G team won over Simon Quan Co. Ltd in 3 sets in the playoffs at the Belize Elementary School Auditorium last Thursday, Au-gust 1.

Victor Hernandez, Eros Dawson, Otis Clother and Ra-sheed Pollard led the Telemedia attacks hammering kills at the net on plays set by Emily Turner and Shanti Roches to win the 1st set 25-23.

The Simon Quan crew proved that they are no push-overs as Shelmadine Cacho, Sherelene Johnson and Crisel Ramirez spiked home points on balls set by Lupita Quan and Karen Quan, while Peter Quan and Alex Quan received the ball and sometimes tricked it over the net to win the second set 26-24. Telemedia prevailed in the 3rd set: 15-12.

In Game 2 of the evening, Scotiabank also made the Be-

lize Bank Bulldogs fight for it. Veteran Oscar Arnold, Mi-chael Hernandez, Arthur Neal and Robbie Gongora served, blocked and hit at the net to win the 1st set 25-23. Belize Bank’s Martin Gongora and Cody Kuylen counterattacked with Judith Hoare setting the plays to win the 2nd set: 25-21, they also took the 3rd set 15-12.

The defending champs, Rebels, had to go to 4 sets to put away their arch rivals, the Scorpions who won the 1st set: 25-18. Stung by this insult, Rebels’ captain Tariq Campbell rallied his forces with Elton Moore, Jason Carvajal, Elton Middleton and libero Robbie Gongora. The Rebels took 2nd and 3rd sets 35-33 and 25-22, and the Scorpions’ tried to take the game to a 5th set, forcing the Rebels to go to extra points to win the 4th set: 26-24. The playoffs continue on Thursday, August 8.

rancho Dolores, August 4, 2013The Lord’s Bank Sunrise softball

ladies walloped the hosts, Rancho Dolores Village Gyals 13-2 when the Belize Rural softball competition con-tinued in Rancho Dolores on Sunday afternoon.

Sunrise’s winning pitcher Sta-cey Smith allowed only 2 runs, while the Lord’s Bank girls wal-loped Angie Smith’s pitching to score 13 runs for a mercy rule win in 3 in-nings.

Rains interrupt play for a while, but the next two scheduled games did not play as one of the teams forfeited.

The UB Jaguars, who are No. 2 in the competition, won over Bermudian Landing’s Arrows Reloaded by default: 7-0. Buttercup Uprising also gave the

league leaders, Double head

Cabbage Mel’s United the easy bye to a 7-0 by de-fault.

The compe-tition continues in Double Head Cabbage on Sun-day with Flowers Bank’s Easy Does It taking on But-tercup Uprising at 11:00am, while Ar-rows Reloaded faces Mel’s United at 1:00pm and UB Jaguars

await Lords Bank Sunrise at 3:00pm.

UB Jaguars team

Page 15: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 1515SPORTSTHE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013

Belikin Western

Spiritsweeps Belmopan

CriteriumBelmopan City, August 3, 2013

Belikin Western Spirits’ Choto brothers Jose, Peter and Rafa-el won 1st, 3rd and 5th places respectively in the final sprint to the finish line after completing 20 laps on the Ring Road from Belmopan Methodist

High School to the Curl Thompson building and back.

Jose Choto won the 1st place tro-phy, a $325 prize, and also the $150 1st prize in the Master’s Division for over-35 riders.

Team Capital City’s Erwin Mid-dleton won the $225 2nd prize, while Peter Choto claimed the $150 3rd prize. Kenroy “Smokes” Gladden, riding unattached, won the $100 4th prize and Rafael Choto collected

the $50 5th prize. Henry Moriera was 6th.

The 1st Junior rider Giovanni Lovell had been leading the race from the 5th lap in a 3-man breakaway with Peter and Giovanni Choto, but Lovell’s fast pace soon dropped Giovanni Choto, but Peter hung on for the next 10 laps. Jose and Rafael Choto were sitting in the back of the main peloton over a minute behind the lead breakaway, saving their energy for the sprint.

Lovell was caught by the main peloton on the 16th lap and Peter Choto and Erwin Mid-dleton took over the pace on the final lap, but Jose won the final sprint. Lovell - 7th overall, won the $150 1st prize among

the juniors; while Team Xibalban’s national junior road champ Oscar Quiros won the $100 2nd prize and Philip Mencias won the $50 3rd prize. Team BECOL’s Joslyn Chavarria was 4th in the Junior category.

Triple B’s defeats DFC

Gentle Touch 3-1

Camalote Blazers & Roaring Creek Grace

Kennedy clash in softball finals

Belize Bank Bulldogs,

Atlantic Bank & Central Health

win Firms basketball games

Kaya Cattouse converts penalty

Myra lee Ho made 1 run

Page 16: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 16

Page 17: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 17

Illegal Guatemalans caught panning for gold inside the Chiquibul forest

Will EU decision dent belize sugar exports?

Belize City, August 5, 2013Neither the Ministry of For-

eign Trade, the Sugar Industry Control Board nor Belize Sugar In-dustries have reacted officially to a decision by the European Union Parliament to bring to an end the sugar quota free arrangement with African, Caribbean and Pacif-ic (ACP) nations in 2017.

The decision, made on June 26, 2013, has attracted some strong reactions from several Ca-ribbean sugar-producing countries who say that it could destabilize their economies. But from author-ities in Belize, there has been a deafening silence.

In a 2001 trade accord be-tween the EU and the 77-nation ACP, called the Cotonou Agree-ment, the EU granted preferen-tial market access for ACP states to level the playing field in the competitive market. This access, agreed to last until the year 2020, included free quotas for sugar ex-ports, meaning they were export-ing goods with minimal to no tax-es. Because sugar is considered a major commodity, the quota has been tariff-free.

But the EU wants a change of rules. They have turned their fo-cus to the “Everything But Arms” treaty also signed in 2001. Under this agreement LDCs get duty free and quota free access to the EU market, for everything but military armaments. 48 countries from across the globe are consid-ered LDCs and Haiti is the only one from the Caribbean region.

The EU says it plans to strengthen the EBAs starting January 2014, and has decided that those who no longer qualify for preferential treatment have a “generation transition period of three years”.

ACP countries have argued that the decision is a breach of economic agreements.

“The ACP have regularly and consistently warned the European Union of the damage that early abolition of beet and isoglucose quotas would cause

make the EU market unstable for ACP sugar producers.

“In spite of this empirical-ly-based forecast of immense dam-

age to ACP sugar industries and, more widely, to ACP economies, the EU decision makers have agreed to put an end to sugar quotas in 2017. This decision calls

into question the coherence of EU policies and seriously undermines the very basis of the long longstanding trade and development coopera-tion partnership between the ACP and the EU,” declared the ACP states release.

ACP nations are calling on the EU to review the situation in 2018 and come up with ap-propriate corrective measures to enable small and vulnerable trading partners to continue with their economic develop-ment and integrate into the world economy.

to their economies. This was seen to contradict and undermine the objectives of the Economic Part-nership Agreements (EPAs) which many of the ACP sugar exporters had entered into or are in the pro-cess of finalizing the negotiations with the EU,” said a June 27 press release from the ACP Secretariat in Brussels.

The ACP release pointed the EU to some of its own research indicat-ing the negative consequences of such as decision, including reduc-tion in market prices, which would

ASR’s BSI Factory

BSI’s BELCOGEN

Page 18: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 18

VENEzUElA DOUblES PETROCARIbE INTEREST - CAN bElIzE AffORD IT?

HABET AND HABET ad

Belize City, July 22, 2013The Barrow Administration has

squandered every opportunity to implement a sound and meaningful socially uplifting program with the millions of dollars it has been able to save through Petrocaribe, a Ven-ezuelan initiative which has provid-ed the country with cheap fuel.

Instead of being used to end poverty or advance education, the money saved through the deal is used to provide balance of pay-ments support to the Government – who, despite the relief, still finds itself in millions of dollars in deficit every year.

With the passing of the initia-tive’s founder, Venezuelan Presi-dent Hugo Chavez, the Barrow Ad-ministration got nervous that the deal would collapse. To their satis-faction, recently-elected President Nicolas Maduro has committed to keep the programme going, but he has introduced adjustments includ-ing an increase in interest.

Under the PetroCaribe agree-ment, which was launched in June 2005, Venezuela allowed Belize and 17 other countries to purchase oil, requiring between five and 50 percent of the cost upfront. The remainder is paid through the pro-vision of food or special services over a period of between 17 and 25 years under a special financing ar-rangement with 1% interest.

This interest under Maduro has stepped up to 2%.

Transparency is certainly not a common feature of the Barrow Government. They have yet to re-veal how many barrels of oil Belize obtains through the Petrocaribe deal, what Belize pays and how.

For example, it is public infor-mation that Nicaragua pays its oil bill of about 11.8 million barrels of oil with 496,389 metric tons of food (beans, coffee, sugar and meat) at a cost of US $1.233 billion. The Do-minican Republic pays with agricul-ture products. Cuba, a special case, provides 30,000 medical profes-sionals to Venezuela.

While the benefits for the Bar-row Administration has been the creation of a financial buffer in our depressed economy, in reality what this has meant is that the Govern-ment has failed to follow through with real objective of Petrocaribe, which is for member countries to utilize the money saved to reduce poverty and social ills. The Barrow Administration is hiding behind the lack of information.

Belizeans have not seen or felt the benefits of Petrocaribe. In fact, if the high prices of fuel at the pumps is any indicator that the Government is getting hundreds of barrels of very cheap fuel daily, one would wonder if the entire deal is simply a mirage under the UDP.

Page 19: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 19

Majority Rules!

ScalesJUSTICEof

by anthony sylvestre

“Majority Rules!” he says in response to the clamour for reform and accountabili-ty. And in the same breath he tries to con-demn the former Prime Minister for the ex-ercise of “overweening executive” power.

I wonder if he really listens to what he says and looks in the mirror- this Prime Min-ister of ours.

Ah mean, his and his UDP colleagues’ despicable behavior in the House of Repre-sentatives on Wednesday confirmed what all Belizeans (except those rabid UDPs) al-ready knew: this UDP Prime Minister and his government are dangerous and out of control. And the danger is that in the face of all the wrongs they are doing on a daily basis in the various government departments like Lands and Forestry, they have face of brass to act pious and want to scold, disrespect and belittle representatives of the people. It is indeed a rare species of men who can do this: have a log in their own eyes and want to talk about the speck in another man’s eyes. The apostle Matthew spoke harshly of these kind of men:

“You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye,” he said. [Matthew 7:5]

For it is indeed tragic and ironic that on the same day, at the same place, when Barrow would try to demean the former prime minister and the PUP Leader, by pull-ing extracts from the CCJ decision, he and his UDP colleagues (Finnegan, Boots, Sedi) would display and manifest that in Belize today, there is “a paucity of checks and bal-ances to restrain an overweening [Legisla-ture],” and that these are indeed “malignant tumors that eat away at democracy.”

Ah mean, ask any sane person, and they will tell you that the Prime Minister and his UDP colleagues’ (Finnegan, Boots & Sedi) behavior in the House on Wednesday are malignant tumors that are eating away at our democracy, destroying our country- the disrespect for those who are not a part of the majority and the abuse of the majority’s positions and privileges- these were all on display by the UDP in the House on Wednes-day. From the taking of legislations through all their readings in one day and passing them, preventing any serious debate or discussion on them from taking place; rail-roading Hon. Julius Espat’s proposal for reform of the Public Accounts Committee on archaic parliamentary technicalities; Fin-negan being contemptuously disrespectful and degrading to the sole woman member of the House and not taken to task by the Speaker; the Prime Minister speaking in the

most disrespectful and un-parliamentary way to the minority opposition mem-bers and the Speaker not for a second admonishing him to have restraint, deco-rum and civility.

These were all on display on Wednesday, and all showed how the abuse of legislative power by the majority and the paucity of checks and balance for the protec-tion of the minority, is a dangerous thing, a “malignant tumour” that, if allowed to continue, will eventually kill democracy in Belize.

And which therefore makes the proposal by Hon. Julius Espat and supported by the PUP parliamentar-ians, so necessary and important. For a Public Accounts Committee (which amongst its remit oversees the spending of monies appropriat-ed) not controlled by the majority, is an excellent devise and check and balance to restrain an abusive and overweening legislature like this UDP one presided by Dean Bar-row.

The former Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. Said Musa in his presentation on Wednesday, had pointed a few

instances of the present out of control, overweening legisla-ture (with majority rule) of Dean Barrow’s and how the courts of Belize have pronounced on numerous occasions that they have passed laws in total vio-lation of the Constitution of Be-lize. Barrow would have none of that. All he wanted to do was to try and use the occasion to de-monize the former prime minis-ter. The court of public opinion has passed judgment on these issues from 2008. They elected Barrow and a UDP government overwhelmingly. They demand-ed accountability, transparency and a curtailing of legislative and executive powers. Barrow promised them this. He has spat in all our faces. For he will tell you now, majority rules, and there isn’t a damn thing you can make him do, right about now.

Page 20: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 20

Happy Holidays!

bTIA stands firmly against Major Cruise Port in Southern belize & Proposed NCl/GOb MOU

The Amandala/

Barrow Affairin the region, the bottom line was that Belize had to get funds from some-where to be able to service its debt. he said that there was a “slightly bitter taste” in his party from the apparent Venezuelan support for the rival PUP in the advance of the election but that he did not rule out the need to ask Ven-ezuela for additional grants or loans. he said that he “won’t follow Chavez’s wake on anti-Americanism” which he said was “if fashionable, not practi-cal.” Barrow noted that his days as a supporter of “noisy nationalism” were over and that he was now “older and wiser.” Barrow concluded by noting that, while a lot of issues were outside of his control, good governance was “totally on us.” he and his government had the power to improve ethical stan-dards and behavior and if they did not do so they could blame no one but themselves.”

We now wonder what the Amandala has to say.

Continued from page 9

Belize City, August 7th, 2013 The Belize Tourism Industry Asso-

ciation (BTIA) remains firmly against establishing a major cruise port in southern Belize and the proposed memorandum of understanding be-tween NCL and the Government of Belize. The BTIA had previously made a public statement in relation to this development at Crawl Caye and over the past couple weeks, has taken note of another option for development at Harvest Caye. The BTIA opposes this proposed development in the south of Belize for the following reasons:

BTIA has publicly supported the National Sustainable Tourism Master Plan and continues to do so as it de-fines the long-term plan for sustain-able tourism in Belize. This plan was recently supported by government and clearly states that “pocket cruise tourism is the only acceptable form of cruise tourism on the south eastern coast of Belize.” The study was em-phatic that southern Belize should re-main an eco-friendly low impact desti-nation. The BTIA supports this plan and the continued growth of the overnight tourism in this area.

The environmental damage the cruise port and quantity of persons from the cruise visits would cause to the pristine marine surroundings and the potential economic and natural re-sources lost is incompatible with long term sustainability and development of Belize’s tourism industry.

The media has brought to the forefront a draft copy of the proposed Memorandum of Understanding with Belize Island Holdings. There are con-

cerns about some of the clauses in this agreement. Government is giving sig-nificant concessions to a large interna-tional company for local development.

Local developers are not able to get these concessions nor is it feasi-ble for government to be giving away these funds, to support a large multi-million company. Belize cannot be giv-ing away more than the country would receive. The MOU is outlining tax ex-emptions for all necessary machinery and equipment, including specialized machinery and equipment and spare parts, building material, fixtures and

fittings, terrestrial and marine vehicles, including aqua-sport equipment, to es-tablish the port and mainland facility available under the Fiscal Incentive Act. But it also entails the return of $4 of ev-ery $7 dollars collected in head taxes to the Cruise Line.

The current overnight sector, which is the mainstay of the tourism indus-try, with continued average growth can earn in excess of $2 billion dollars when compared to the average growth of the cruise sector over the same period as outlined in the Tourism Master Plan.

The National BTIA remains stead-

fastly opposed to the introduction of mass cruise tourism to southern Be-lize. The BTIA asks that government takes a step back and brings these pro-posals to the public and private sectors and together define a policy toward cruise tourism, develop policies and programs that will promote the long term economic, social and environ-mental well-being of Belize.

The BTIA urges the Cabinet and the Ministry of Tourism to re-consider all the ramifications of this proposed project and reject it outright and imme-diately. (Press Release)

Page 21: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 21

Reid

By G. Michael reid“If you think of yourselves as

helpless and ineffectual, it is certain that you will create a despotic gov-ernment to be your master. The wise despot, therefore, maintains among his subjects a popular sense that they are helpless and ineffectual.” - Frank Herbert, The Dosadi Experi-ment

The general consensus is that the Westminster system under which we are governed is simply not working. Since Independence, we have switched political parties six times only to be left with the same disappointing result each time. The parties both come in and start out with fantastic promises and prom-ising potential only to seemingly switch gears shortly into their term of office. I am speaking as a PUP but cognizant of the fact that things have not always worked well under this party either. It is high time that we consider making a few changes.

The genius Albert Einstein once defined insanity as “doing the same thing over and over and expecting dif-ferent results”. Might we now qualify for that status? Every five years or so, we go to the polls and elect one political party over the other. We then give them a mandate to rule and to do as they will with the resources of the country. Invariably and traditional-ly, we realize before long, that those elected are simply abusing the pow-er given and feathering their own nests with little regard for the inter-est of the people. So we go back to the polls and vote them out and vote another set in. When do we realize that doing the same thing over and over will only yield the same results? When do we realize that instead of just changing the players, we need to start changing the rules or at least enforce the ones that exist?

I do not entirely agree with the premise that the system under which we are governed cannot work. The fact is that there are adequate checks and balances available to keep these politicians restrained. We have a Con-tractor General and an Auditor Gen-eral. We have an Integrity Commis-

sion and a Public Accounts Committee that is supposed to provide oversight and report to the people in the event of misappropriations. How though, can any of this work if we leave it up to the party in power to select those who will watch over them? I do not believe that in this country of 300,000 plus people, we cannot find non-partisan and objec-tive thinking people to fill these jobs. It makes no sense for us to leave it up to these politicians to police themselves. What do we expect will happen?

This week, the area representa-tive for Cayo South tried a thing in the House. It was the first step on a long journey but as the Chinese would say,

the first step is where every journey must start. During their last term in office, the PUP made the bold move of enabling the Chairman of the Public

jury is still out as to how well govern-ments have done with those proposals but the fact is that the effort was made.

Any able thinking Belizean will ad-mit that the need for serious political reform is pressing. Despite grandeur promises of “jumping into action at the

New Rules

Last election, the Prime Minister doled out separate amounts of $40,000 and $50,000

to all Standard Bearers just before election. when asked where the mon-ey came from, the Prime Minister in-formed that it was from BTL dividends

slightest whiff of corruption”, Mr. Bar-row’s government has been plagued from the very outset by reports after report of vile practices. Cabinet Minis-ters have been living high on the hog and way above their means; driving high-end luxury automobiles and fly-ing first-class around the world, all at the expense of taxpayers. Ministers have been sharing out land and other government resources to relatives and friends with no accounting to anyone. Julius Espat is right; the Public Ac-counts Committee might be a good place to start.

What Julius is asking for makes perfect sense. Instead of the commit-tee being comprised of four members of government and two members from the opposition, let’s even it up at two and two and bring in three mem-bers from the Senate. According to

Mr. Espat, the Churches, the Unions and Chamber of Commerce could do well to level off the field of members. Of course, the Prime Minister has al-ready gone on record in opposing the

moratorium of at least a month on new citizens before election and an elected Senate are just a few of the proposals so far. This man means business! I must say however, that I would be more in favor of a thirteenth senator than of an elected Senate. Given that Belizeans tend to vote down the line, I would not want to see the same scenario repeat itself if the House and Senate are elected from the same party. The idea is for oversight and a mechanism for proper checks and balance in place.

Another area that needs to be looked at is the monies that are spent during campaigns. Last election, the Prime Minister doled out separate amounts of $40,000 and $50,000 to all Standard Bearers just before election. When asked where the money came from, the Prime Minister informed that it was from BTL dividends. Did no one see anything wrong with this? Visit any polling station during any election and one can see huge sums of money being handed out for votes. At the end of the day, it is not the best candidate that wins but the one who

pays the most.There is one more aspect

that must be considered and that is the media. The media plays a very important role in holding politicians in check. A few pennies here and there in the way of extra advertis-ing can place a whole new perspective on a news story. I had almost finished writing this article when I read Tues-day’s Amandala. The man seemed to have read my

mind. Of course, his angle seemed more at railing at the PUP for daring to criticize him and maybe a warning to the UDP that there was too much going to Guardian and not enough going to him. Whatever the case, it is a matter of serious concern. Maybe media houses should be required to post government busi-ness (not propaganda) in return for licensing fees. The media plays too important a role in the shaping of people opinions to be bought and paid for by any political party. Let us resume the serious discussion of true political reform. It is time to start playing by new rules!

proposal. The Prime Minister says that Julius Espat is trying to give rule to the minority. According to Espat, it is not about rule at all but about proper oversight.

Of course, the UDP’s main de-fense is that “you guys did it too so why should we stop now”. Well, it has to stop at some point. I like what Fran-cis Fonseca and the PUP are saying. A four-year term of office, removal of “ministerial discretion” from the laws,

Accounts Committee to be selected from the opposition. Say what you will, but the PUP has always been a party inclined to reform. As far back as 1994 while in Opposition, the PUP had com-menced an internal process for study-ing the political system and developing proposals for reform. In December of 1999, three months after being elect-ed, the new PUP government estab-lished a broad-based Political Reform Commission which was given a year to submit proposals to parliament. The

Page 22: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 22

Intuition: Sensory Perception of the Soul

By Dr. Angela Banner Joseph“Intuition is always right in at least

two important ways: It is always in re-sponse to something. It always has your best interest at heart” - Gavin de Becker, The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence

What is intuition and how do we use that sixth sense in our daily living? The Columbia Encyclopedia, 2012, de-scribed intuition as “a way of knowing directly; immediate apprehension.” Intu-ition comes in several forms: a dream, a sense of déjà vu, a shiver of something happening to you, or an image in your subconscious of a future event.

Some people believe that God knows directly about what is happening in our lives, while others believe that people reach concrete decisions by rea-soning. Some believe that we are born already knowing about what we need to know. However, at peak moments in our lives, we do not listen to our inner voice or to our gut instinct to access that knowledge.

Writer C. joyBell C. believes, “Our bodies have five senses: touch, smell, taste, sight, hearing. But not to be over-looked are the senses of our souls: in-tuition, peace, foresight, trust, empathy. The differences between people lie in their use of these senses; most peo-ple don’t know anything about the inner senses while a few people rely on them just as they rely on their physical senses, and in fact, probably even more.”

I write to share that we all have in-tuitive skills: some more than others. That sense of power is in the core of our souls, male and female. There are peo-ple who have mastered the technique of listening to their inner voice. C.J. Heck, in Bits and Pieces: Short Stories from a Writer’s Soul, wrote, “We all have an in-ner voice, our personal whisper from the universe. All we have to do is listen—feel and sense it with an open heart. Sometimes it whispers of intuition or precognition. Other times, it whispers an awareness, a remembrance from another plane. Dare to listen. Dare to hear with your heart.”

Read what happened to me when I did not listen to my intuition. One day a col-league of mine gave me a ride to visit my grandmother, who was in the intensive care unit of a hospital. I shared that I had to get there fast and in a hurry because I sensed that my grandmother was not do-ing well. As we drove to the hospital, my colleague decided to stop at a fast food restaurant to get us something to eat. I was a little upset, because he did not see the urgency to get there.

As we pulled out of the fast food restaurant, we saw my sister in her car at the stoplight. I yelled to get her attention and asked her where she was going. She said she had received a phone call from the hospital that instructed us to get there immediately, because grandmother had taken a turn for the worse. We raced to the hospi-tal and arrived 15 minutes later. As I got out of the car, I turned to my friend to say that we arrived too late...grandmother had expired. He told me to stop playing. As we entered the hospital and rushed to her room, we were stopped by several nurses who told us our grandmother had passed 15 min-utes ago. I was upset because I should have listened to my instinct to get there sooner.

That experience taught me to listen to my instincts and the small whispers when I don’t know why I should listen to them. In society, we often hear that rational thinking is better than intuition. Sylvia Clare, in Trusting Your Intuition: redis-cover Your True Self to Achieve a richer, More rewarding Life, contended, “Intuition means ex-actly what it sounds like, in-tuition! An inner tutor or teaching and learning mechanism that takes us forward daily. It is a resource that, where recognized, has infinite potential.” She further noted, “In-tuition is the highest form of intel-ligence, transcending all individual abilities and skills”.

We have a tendency not to listen to our intuition until it is too late. I believe that Albert Einstein described intuition best. He stated, “The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful ser-vant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift. We will not solve the problems of the world from the same level of thinking we were at when we created them. More than anything else, this new century demands new thinking: We must change our materially based analyses of the world around us to include broader, more multidimensional perspectives.”

Learning to listen to our in-tuition is a step in learning to trust ourselves. It is important to listen to the signals or clues that come to us. As actor Alan Alda contended, “At times you have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you’ll dis-cover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover is yourself.”

Dr. Angela Banner Joseph holds a doctorate degree in Edu-cational Leadership and Change from the Fielding Graduate Uni-versity

For SaleBy Order of the Mortgagee

Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd., a Company duly registered under the Companies Act, Chapter 250 of the Laws of Belize, Revised Edition, 2000, and having its registered office at Cor. Albert and Bishop Streets, Belize City, Belize, hereby gives notice of its intention to exercise its power of sale as Mortgagee under a Deed of Mortgage made the 25th day of January, 2011, between Priscilla Graham & Dennis Moore of the one part, and the said SCOTIABANK (BELIZE) LTD. of the other part , and recorded in Deeds Book Volume 2 of 2011 at folios 1473 – 1538. The said SCOTIABANK (BELIZE) LTD. will at the expiration of two months from the date of the first publication of this notice sell the property described in the Schedule hereto.

All offers to purchase the said property must be made in writing and full particulars and conditions of sale may be obtained from the said SCOTIABANK (BELIZE) LTD.

THE SCHEDULE ABOVE REFERRED TO

ALL THAT block piece or parcel of land containing fifty (50) acres of lands (Block No. 11) situate on the North Side of the Punta Gorda/San Antonio Road near the Rice Reserve, Toledo District and bounded:-On the North by Crown Lands (Swamp); On the South by Block No. 10 lands of Allistair King; On the East by Block Nos. 14 & 15 lands of C. Williams & Allistair King; On the West by Block Nos. 6, 7 & 8 lands of S. Coleman & Zadock Moore measuring 1650 feet x 1320 feet as shown on Plan No. 906 by H.C. Fairweather at the Survey Department TOGETHER with all buildings and erections standing and being thereon.

DATED this 31st day of July, 2013.MUSA & BALDErAMOS

91 North Front Street, Belize CityAttorneys-at-Law for Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd.

Page 23: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 23

BELIZE TIMESThe fastest selling newspaper in Belize

Cruise Ship industry challenge

Home Economics

By richard harrisonThose who are against the

NCL proposal to create large-scale cruise tourism near Pla-cencia in the south claim that they are defending the greater national interest and not mere-ly reacting to what they see as a potential threat to their own self-interest (which they have all rights to do).

These actors would do well to pursue two parallel strate-gies, instead of one:

(1) to amplify, in triangu-lation, their existing position against the NCL investment

(2) to push for changes in laws and policies that govern the cruise ship sector, so that more FRAGMENTATION of the sector would increase the numbers that benefit from the crumbs that fall off the table

By adding this second strategy, they will be showing that they are truly in the best interest of Belizean people.

In the Bahamas......there is a place called “over the hill”. Does anyone know what this means?

GDP Per Capita (PPP), US Dollars for Bahamas in year 2013 is US$ 32,397.94.

This makes Bahamas No. 29 in world rankings accord-ing to GDP Per Capita (PPP), US Dollars in year 2013. The world’s average GDP Per Cap-ita (PPP), US Dollars value is US$ 15173.51; Bahamas is US$17,224.43 more than the average.

GDP Per Capita (PPP), US Dollars for Belize in year 2013 is US$ 8,963.61.

This makes Belize No. 95 in world rankings accord-ing to GDP Per Capita (PPP), US Dollars in year 2013. The world’s average GDP Per Cap-ita (PPP), US Dollars value is US$ 15173.51; Belize is US$ 6,209.90 less than the aver-age.

Policies that promote and facilitate DISTRIBUTION of wealth is as important as those that promote and facili-tate GROWTH of wealth.

For example, FRAGMEN-TATION of the cruise tourism business would allow the pie to be shared among many more hands.....that is, more widely DISTRIBUTED.

CONCENTRATION of the sector into a few hands how-ever, leaves too many bel-lies hungry....while a couple greedy cats get obese.

Our SOUTH-SIDE of BE-LIZE CITY is our “OVER-THE-HILL”......it is our biggest SHAME. We should all hang our heads in shame realizing that all of us have allowed this condition to happen to our very own, over a very long period of time. We need to all do our part to mobilize all the necessary resources to fix this shame.

BUT....more than that.....we need to speak up....with every voice.....against CON-CENTRATION....and for FRAG-MENTATION of the cruise tourism sector. The laws and policies that govern this sub-sector should be over-hauled immediately to reflect this ambition....this needs to be done NOW.....otherwise....it will just be like.....WATER UNDER THE BRIDGE.

The un-elected Minister who is the PM’s go-to man for big business is not answerable to anyone, except the PM, at the end of the day. It was seen quite clearly in sugar negotia-tions....and others.

It might be much more possible to get this second strategy than to get the first.

If the NCL deal goes through.....which am predict-ing it will.....and the sector re-mains CONCENTRATED in the hands of a few....everybody loses.

Fragmentation is a most realistic thing that can be achieve.....even as the strug-gle continues to derail the NCL deal.

Richard Harrison is a local businessman and investor in the manufacturing and service industries. Mr. Harrison holds a Masters in Business Admin-istration degree from Lancast-er University, United Kingdom. Send comments to [email protected]

For SaleBy Order of the

Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd., a company duly registered under the Companies Act, Chap-ter 250 of the Laws of Belize, Revised Edi-tion, 2000, and having its registered office at Cor. Albert and Bishop Streets, Belize City, Belize, hereby gives notice of its intention to exercise its power of sale as Mortgagee un-der a Deed of Mortgage made the 4th day of May, 2010, between MONICA MARCEL-LO of Pescador Drive, San Pedro Town, Ambergris Caye, Belize District, Belize of the one part, and Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd., of the other part, and recorded at the Land Titles Unit in the Deeds Book Vol. 14 of 2010 at Folios 803–830, the said Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd. will at the expiration of two months from the date of the first publication of this notice sell the property described in the schedule hereto.

All offers to purchase the said property must be made in writing and full particulars and conditions of sale may be obtained from the said Scotiabank (Belize) Ltd.

SCHEDULE

ALL THAT piece or parcel of land the subject of Minister’s Fiat Grant No. 874 of 1999 dates 11th October, 1999, being Block No. 3 comprising of 10 acres of land situate in the Ten Acre Holdings, Stann Creek District, Belize, bounded and de-scribed as shown on Plan No. 874 of 1999 attached to the said Grant.

DATED this 5th day of August, 2013.MUSA & BALDErAMOS

91 North Front StreetBelize City

Attorney-at-Law forScotiabank (Belize) Ltd.

Page 24: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 24

LIQUOR LICENSE NOTICES

Notice is hereby given that RON-ALD D. MOORE is applying for a Restaurant and Bar Liquor Li-cense to be operated at “Blues, Booze and BarB’Que”, situate at Main Street Caye Caulker Village, Belize District under the Intoxicat-ing Liquor Licensing Ordinance Revised Edition 1980.

Norris Alexander Wade, 79Florene Ogaldez, 61

Floyd Colin Foreman, 51Eleanor Martinez, 85

Balbina Cornelia Ucan, 71Julian de la Fuente, 70

Harry Robinson, 82Ernie Lorie Williams, 98Joi Una Mitchell White, 2

Dalton Quello, 74Dorla Eugenia Stuart, 74

DEATHS

Recipe of the week

INGrEDIENTS

• 21/4 to23/4cupsall-pur-poseflour

• 1packageactivedryyeast(21/4tsp)

• 3/4tsp.salt• 3/4cupwarmwater(120to

130degrees)• 2Tbsps.oliveoilorcooking

oil• 1Tbsps.sugarorhoney• 1eggyolk• 1eggwhite

Quick Kid-Friendly Breadsticks

Born to Gerald Roland Nabet and Charlene Marannette Nabet nee

Estala, twins,Zian Yazir (boy) and Zamari

Ixantle (girl).Born to Gabriel Choco and Virginia

Choco nee Chiac, a boy,Jefferson Kyle

Born to David Charles Sewell and Margaret Elizabeth Sewell nee

Flowers, a girl,Davina Davisha

Born to Herbert Jones Stuart and Delsia Lupita Stuart nee Dawson,

a boy, Genesis Deshane

Born to Albert Luis Halliday, Sr., and Camisha Kristine Halliday nee

Itza, a boy, Albert Luis, Jr.

Born to Lloyd Lawrence Young and Royalyn Amanda Young nee

Alarcon, a boy,Kavik Lloyd

Born to Brian Lee Ferguson and Cherese Ferguson nee Reynolds,

a boy,Conner Amir

Born to Kenrick Lincoln Martinez, Sr., and Sheena Melenie Martinez

nee Galvez, a boy,Kenrick Lincoln, Jr.

Born to Elisama Mardoqueo Tzib, Sr., and Kimberly Nicole Tzib nee

Kelly, a boy,Elisama Mardoqueo, Jr.

Born to Juliancito Hernandez and Lesty Johanna Hernandez nee

Mena, a girl,Juliah Jemima

Born to Cornelius Enns and Sara Enns nee Banman, a girl,

MargarethaBorn to Joseph Fernandez and

Deivy Anne Fernandez nee Cowo, a girl,

Joniel JanelleBorn to Carlos Fabio Carvajal and Elvia Noemi Carvajal nee Canto,

a boy,Aiden Fabio

Born to Daniel Teck and Melissa Yaniry Teck nee Mendez, a boy,

Dariel Evander

BIRTHSMARRIAGESAlfredo Maquin, 22, to Odilia Josefina

Chiac, 16, both of San Benito Poite, Toledo District

Benedicto Gregorio Coc, 24, of San Pedro Columbia, Toledo District,

to Demesuela Kuk, 24, of Aguacate, Toledo District

Ambrosio Ac, 28, to Utilda Coy, 22, both of Otoxha, Toledo District

Martin Teul, 24, of Maya Mopan, Stann Creek District, to Terry Teresa

Coc, 21, of Otoxha, Toledo DistrictPrimitivo Pop, 23, of Indian Creek,

Toledo District, to Evangelina Choco, 19, of Hicatee, Toledo District

Samuel Tzul, 19, of San Felipe, Toledo District, to Benefilia Amoria Cho, 20,

of San Antonio, Toledo DistrictElroy Jerome Flores, 45, to Agatha

Olivia Aranda, 42, both of Dangriga Town, Stann Creek District

Michael Emeka Ejike, 28, of Dangriga Town, Stann Creek District, to Angela

Louise Greco, 45, of Miamisburg, Ohio, U.S.A.

Wilfredo Zetina, 34, to Ingrid Rodri-guez, 24, both of San Ignacio Town,

Cayo DistrictElesio Cus, 46, to Marcela Coc, 28, both

of San Miguel, Toledo DistrictEstevan Choc, 24, to Maritza Ana Ical, 18, both of Machaca, Toledo DistrictFredy Enrique Cortes, 29, to Carmen

Vasquez, 36, both of Trial Farm, Orange Walk District

Everal Michael Wade, 50, to Kendra Letecia Allen, 35, both of Belize CityJose Antonio Ramires, 34, to Ignacia Grijalva, 37, both of La Gracia, Cayo

DistrictWilliam Douglas Bailey, 46, of Wells,

Maine, U.S.A., to Laura Elizabeth Gorwood, 48, of Lyman, Maine, U.S.A.Jason Richard Irwin, 38, to Ella Ruth Grutman, 37, both of West Hills, Los

Angeles, California, U.S.A.Mack Courtland Seaton, 56, to Allison Lanford Schratz, 49, both of German-

town, Tennessee, U.S.A.

Stacey Todd Cruthird, 51, to Donna Bryant Clark, 47, both of Tyler, Texas,

U.S.A.Vaughn Emmanuel Brakeman, 42, of Gracie Rock, Belize District, to Bambi

Danalee Morris, 47, of Hattieville, Belize District

Delroy Trimane Reyes, 23, to Vanessa Desmarte Sho, 22, both of Belize City

Shannon Robert Manning, 37, to Katie Lynn Kocher, 33, both of Reno, Nevada,

U.S.A.Donnie Crevin Banks, II, 24, to Katelyn Michelle Adkins, 24, both of Lexington,

Kentucky, U.S.A.Justin Free Quinn, 32, to Eva Rose

Pasch Anderson, 30, both of Somerville, Massachusetts, U.S.A.

Umar Moulta-Ali, 33, to Nadine Beatrice Patnett, 28, both of Baltimore,

Maryland, U.S.A.Eric Dobson Crawford, 29, of Hornby Island, British Columbia, Canada, to Nelva Ramos Gomez, 35, of Estado de

Mexico, MexicoAlvin Robert Vasquez, Sr., 49, to Jac-

queline Alma Rhodas, 40, both of Santa Elena Town, Cayo District

Marlon Rolando Gomez Hernandez, 24, to Toni Allison Bagwell, 32, both of

Lilburn, Georgia, U.S.A.Trevor Scott Dallas, 36, to Tera Keesee,

40, both of Austin, Texas, U.S.A.Santos David Murcia, 21, of Sarawee,

Stann Creek District, to Karen Vanessa Escobar, 16, of Dangriga Town, Stann

Creek District

DIrECTIONS• Adult: In a large mixing

bowlstirtogether1cupoftheflour,theyeast,andsalt.

In another bowl combine warmwater,oil,sugar,andeggyolk.Addwatermixturetodrymixture.

Beat with an electric mixer on low tomediumspeedfor30seconds,scrapingthesidesofthebowlconstantly.

Beatonhighspeedfor3minutes.Usingawoodenspoon,stirinasmuchremainingflourasyoucan.

• Adult:Turnthedoughontoalightlyflouredsurface.Kneadinenoughremainingflourtomakemoderatelystiffdoughthatis

This recipe is suitable for little bakers between the ages of 6-15.

smooth and elastic (6 to 8 minutestotal).Coverand letdoughriseuntilnearlydoubleinsize(about1hour).

• Together: Punch doughdown. Cover; let rest 10 minutes.Greaseabakingsheet.Dividedoughinhalf.Divideeachportioninto8piec-es.

• Together: On a floured sur-face, roll each piece into a 12-inch-longropeforthin,crispysticksorintoa 6-inch-long rope for thick, chewysticks.

• Adult: Place2inchesaparton prepared baking sheet. Cover;let rise until nearly double in size(about45minutes).

• Adult: Preheatovento425degreesF.Beattogethereggwhiteand1tablespoonwateruntilfrothy.

• Kid: Brush over bread-sticks.Sprinklewithcoarsesalt.

• Adult:Bakeabout10min-utesoruntilgolden.Removefrombakingsheet.Coolonwirerack.

• Makes16breadsticks.

Hon Jose Mai

Orange walk District, August 5, 2013

On Sunday 4th August, the Hon Jose Mai joined the Guinea Grass village council in hosting a football tournament.

Seven teams participated and the winner was Atlantic Insurance in Belize City. Sec-ond place was won by Guin-

supports Guinea Grass village council

ea Grass Argenti-na and third place was won by Guinea Grass United.

The Hon. Jose and the newly elect-ed Independent Village Council of Guinea Grass have pledged to work together in devel-oping sports in the community. This weekend the Hon Jose Mai and the

Guinea Grass Village Coun-cil will launch a 5-a-side football tournament in the community.

The Hon Jose Mai con-gratulates the Village Coun-cil of Guinea Grass for their vision and desire to help develop the Guinea Grass community.

Page 25: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 25

x n nián kuài lèKung Hei Fat Choy!Sun leen fai lok!

JOIN THE DOTS

Write the time shown on each clock. Write it the “regular way” and the “smart way.” The first one has been done for you.

CON

NEC

T TH

E D

OTS

!

SUD

OKU

FO

R KI

DS

Page 26: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 26

BRAIN TEASER

See answers NEXT WEEK

SUDOKU PUZZLE #29/2013

SUDOKU PUZZLE SOLUTION #28/2013Answers for last week’s puzzleAnswers for last week’s puzzle

hold successful meeting in Western Zone

See answers NEXT WEEK

Marshalls President

San Ignacio Town, August 8, 2013National President of the PUP

Marshalls Corps Stephen Latchman organized one of his most success-ful meetings.

A meeting was held with the members of the PUP Western Cau-cus on Saturday August 3rd, 2013 at the Cahal Pech Resort which was well attended by the young, mid-dle-aged and senior adults of the area all pledged their continued sup-port for the work of the Marshalls Unit, and the leadership of the Party.

Meetings with members of the Marshalls will continue, and the nest one is slated for members of the Southern Caucus. We will con-tinue to serve the people.

Marshall’s President Stephen Latch-ment (L) addressing members

Page 27: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 27

SCIENCE & TECHBELIZE TIMES WEEKLY

R E V I E W

Selected By Chris Williams

Sun Will flip Its Magnetic field Soon

by Miriam KramerThe sun is gearing up for a

major solar flip, NASA says.In an event that occurs once

every 11 years, the magnetic field of the sun will change its polarity in a matter of months, according new observations by NASA-sup-ported observatories.

The flipping of the sun’s mag-netic field marks the peak of the star’s 11-year solar cycle and the halfway point in the sun’s “solar maximum” — the peak of its solar weather cycle. NASA released a new video describing the sun’s magnetic flip on Monday (Aug. 5).

“It looks like we’re no more than three to four months away from a complete field reversal,” Todd Hoeksema, the director of Stanford University’s Wilcox Solar Observatory, said in a statement. “This change will have ripple effects throughout the solar sys-tem.”

As the field shifts, the “cur-rent sheet” — a surface that radiates billions of kilometers outward from the sun’s equator

Poor sleep makes food more appealing

— becomes very wavy, NASA officials said. Earth orbits the sun, dipping in and out of the waves of the current sheet. The transition from a wave to a dip can create stormy space weather around Earth, NASA officials said.

“The sun’s polar magnetic fields weaken, go to zero, and then emerge again with the

nova explosions, zip through the universe at nearly the speed of light. They can harm satellites and astronauts in space, and the wrinkled current sheet better protects the planet from these particles.

The effects of the rippled sheet can also be felt throughout the solar system, far beyond Plu-to and even touching the Voyager probes near the barrier of inter-stellar space.

“The sun’s north pole has already changed sign, while the south pole is racing to catch up,” Scherrer said. “Soon, however, both poles will be reversed, and the second half of solar max will be underway.”

The current solar maximum is the weakest in 100 years, experts have said. Usually, at the height of a solar cycle, sunspot activity increases. These dark regions on the sun’s surface can give birth to solar flares and ejections, but there have been fewer observed sunspots this year than in the maximums of previous cycles.

opposite polarity,” Stanford solar physicist Phil Scherrer said in a statement. “This is a regular part of the solar cycle.”

While the polarity shift can stir up some stormy weather, it also provides extra shielding from dangerous cosmic rays. These high-energy particles, which are accelerated by events like super-

7 August 2013 by Colin BarrasIf there was ever a study not

to lose sleep over, it’s this one. People deprived of a good night’s rest are more likely to experience changes in brain activity that can increase the urge to eat high-cal-orie foods.

Matthew Walker at the Uni-versity of California in Berkeley and colleagues conducted the first study of brain activity in re-lation to food among sleep-de-prived people. The team used fMRI to study brain patterns in 23 people, first after a night of peaceful sleep and then after a night without sleep.

Sleep deprivation reduced ac-tivity in three areas of the brain that help, among other things, to process odour and flavour signals. It also led to more activity in the amygdala, which helps govern the motivation to eat. The team also found that volunteers rated pic-tures of high-calorie foods as more desirable after no sleep than after a good rest.

It may make evolutionary sense, says Laurent Brondel at the University of Burgundy in Dijon, France. The long summer days at higher latitudes deprive animals of sleep, but they use their time awake to eat more, which helps

them get through the short days of winter when food is scarcer.

Bad for healthThat’s only part of the story,

though, says Stephanie Greer, another member of the team and also at the University of Cal-ifornia, Berkeley. The body does need more energy if someone re-mains awake for longer – but the high-calorie foods that become more desirable after sleep depri-vation would more than meet this additional need. The changes in food desirability encouraged by the sleep-deprived brain may originally have been an important adaptation but today they are maladaptive and

no longer benefit our health.Brondel agrees with this

conclusion. “Sleep deprivation could, by an unknown mecha-nism, modify the hedonic sen-sation and alter the ingestive behaviour,” he says.

Whatever the mechanism, there is one clear message from the study, says Greer. “These findings provide opportunities to adjust our environment and behaviour in new ways to com-bat such health issues,” she says. “Specifically, our study in-dicates that one choice people can make is to regularly obtain sufficient amounts of sleep.”

Page 28: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 28

Political Maturity

While attending a house meeting this Sunday, the topic was brought up by the speaker of the house, concern-ing a king who had a birthday party. He had a beautiful young lady who danced so well that he offered her anything she wanted, up to half of his

kingdom. A couple minutes later, he was very disappointed by his intoxicated offer where in the middle of his party the head of a man was brought on a plate. The young girl asked for the head of John the Baptist!

As I think of this king, my mind goes to country of Be-lize. See, many people do not understand the difference be-tween Belize and Heaven! Heaven is owned by a King who has the potential to offer you half of his kingdom or anything he wants because it’s his. You cannot vote out a king, protest against a king, change the king’s laws or decide which one you are going to keep and you do not go to a king to tell him what to do. Even the air you breathe the king owns.

Belize is a totally different situation. We have what is called a democracy…although I prefer to call it a five year mini kingdom. We end up with a ton-load of ministers who even in the year 2013 with all the technology, seem not to know what is happening in the country they are running or, may I suggest, that is now the famous excuse! These minis-ters suffer from dangerous political concussions the minute their party wins an election. Some of the symptoms include political amnesia, blindness, closely followed by a political “crack head” syndrome.

It seems that a party is at its best while in the opposition. Its political screensaver displays a sense of caring, humility, levelheadedness, openness, sincerity, and honesty. But sad-ly for many countries, and Belize is no exception, something happens as a party enters into power. In the same way one has to strip himself of metal infested wear while entering through a security scanner, it seems each minister has to strip himself of all the quality material they showoff while in the seat of the opposition. The only strong evidence of de-mocracy shown in the country is the election process where politicians come humbly to your home to beg your vote but the minute the deal is sealed with a five year agreement, democracy fades away.

We are a young country that has not grown up as yet. The big question is “how do you deal with immaturity?”

Well, it begins and ends with fathering! Whosoever we produce now is a product of what we have raised up in pre-vious years. If there is immaturity, then accountability has to be required, and supervision becomes vital!

The king mentioned earlier was probably drunk when he made the offer to the young girl. After all it was his birthday party and he was having fun, but he lost his head in the midst of the process and it ended up with one of his citizens innocently losing his head!

What are we losing as a county when we function imma-turely? Let’s bridge that gap between the screen saver and reality. Let’s carry across the same behavior we modeled during courtship into the marriage. Let’s require all minis-ters, to those in power, and those awaiting power to keep their values and disposition and passion expressed while in the opposition and live by it while in power!

Until next week.God Bless!

Exercise for Healthy Bones

and JointsThe human body was designed for physical activity and movement. Hu-

mans were not designed for today’s sedentary lifestyle. Regular physical activity is vital for building and maintaining healthy bones and joints and for a healthy lifestyle.

The foundation for a lifetime of strong healthy bones is built only during the childhood years of rapid growth, mostly between the ages of 10 to 20 years. Bone mass peaks at about 30 years of age. When we get older, physical activity can no longer increase bone mass. Exercise will slow bone

loss and maintain muscle mass which serves to support bone and joints.

As we get older, our bodies change. Bones can become weak and fragile, which is a bone –thinning disease called osteoporosis. Muscle size and strength de-crease (a condition called muscle atrophy) mostly due to inactivity. Bone

mass and density decrease, increasing the risk of breaking a bone (frac-ture). Ligaments and tendons lose their elasticity, making it easier to suffer injuries such as rotator cuff tendonitis, tennis elbow or Achilles tendonitis. Joint inflammation and cartilage degeneration (arthritis) occurs.

Exercise works on bones much like it works on muscles — by making them stronger. Here are types of exercises:

weight-bearing ExerciseWeight-bearing and strength-training exercise are effective for building

strong bones and muscles that support joints. Weight-bearing exercises are activities done on the feet that work the bones and muscles against gravity. The bones undergo stress and are strengthened. Walking, jogging, dancing and jumping rope are examples of weight-bearing exercises.

Strength-training ExerciseStrength-training exercises are activities that add resistance to move-

ment causing muscles to work harder and grow stronger. Strength training exercises include using weight machines, working with free weights, or doing exercises that use your own body weight (push-ups, pull-ups and iso-metric exercises). These resistance exercises also put stress on bones and have bone-building capacity.

Non-Impact and Low-Impact ExercisesFor the elderly and people with osteoporosis and arthritis, non-impact

exercises, such as yoga, or tai chi, are useful. Low impact exercises such as swimming and cycling are also useful. Though these non-impact or low-im-pact exercises are not as effective at strengthening bone, they provide some muscle strengthening, stretching for flexibility and balance training benefits. They also improve heart and lung function.

People suffering from arthritis should avoid exercises that are high im-pact, like aerobic workouts, running, jogging, climbing stairs, uneven or rug-ged terrain and competitive sports such as volleyball and basketball. These activities put excessive stress on the cartilaginous surfaces of joints causing further deterioration. Rather, people with arthritis should engage in more balanced fitness programs like walking, swimming, cycling and stretching exercises. The stronger the muscles supporting the joints and the more flex-ible the ligaments and tendons, the healthier the cartilaginous tissue and bone will be.

All exercise should include stretching and balance training. Stretching should be done after all exercise. Studies have shown that balance training and tai chi have decreased falls and reduced the risk of hip fractures signifi-cantly.

Starting a Program for Bone and Joint health30 minutes of weight-bearing activity, 4 or more days a week is a good

way to start an exercise program for bone and joint health. For strength training, exercise each major muscle group at least twice a week. Rest for a full day between strength sessions. Stretch after all exercise.

By Dr. Francis Smith

Page 29: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 29

PM Plays Passam

OUT OUT

Continued from page 2 Continued from page 2

Continued from page 2

Mark King is a joke

isn’t or can’t go nowhere.King thinks he won the last elections

because people like him, but he is badly confused. His win was a fluke, a stroke of luck. That luck has run out.

King is living off the people of Lake I, and the news story of his living in a man-sion begs many questions. How can he afford to live like a King? King’s lifestyle – mansion, luxury cars and bodyguards – is far removed from the reality we face ‘back a Lake’.

We need a real leader in our division and only the PUP knows how to bring real leaders. As for King, we have a royal gift for him come election day. On that day he will find out he is just a bad joke.

Signed,Queen of Lake I

Stop living in the past PM Barrow

this CCJ ruling, bringing up matters that happened nearly 10 years ago. Man, let’s move forward. Is this PM going to remind us until 2017 about Musa & Fonseca?

Yes they have done wrong; that’s why the people voted them out and the PUP is the Opposition. I must agree with the member from Orange Walk Central, the ruling is now history – let’s move on. I think the PM wants this to be his trump card but nobody in the media and talk shows have given their view on it.

Move forward PM, we have a lot of problems presently which you have to solve. Rosewood, Maya land rights, and the cries from the people who are suffer-ing.

Signed,Hakeem Bush

Should we drill for Oil in the Sarstoon

Temash National Park?

point here. These are lands of the indigenous people: the Maya & Garifuna. SATIIM is help-ing to safeguard what their ancestors have left for them. This park is rich with resources, which the Maya and Garifuna people “tradi-tionally” rely on to make a living.

However, the new proposed co manage-ment agreement with SATIIM allows third party access into the park. SATIIM doesn’t agree with this and haven’t signed the agree-ment. Furthermore, the Government has dismissed their management of the park be-cause of their delay in signing this agreement. Now, SATIIM is not allowed to enter the park to perform their regular operations (I believe B.D.F is carrying out security and making sure of this). If I may divert a bit, Chiquibul in the west is losing billions of dollars in its resourc-es to outsiders – is the Government worried about this? Aren’t they putting enough secu-rity there too?

We also know that this is communal land, as the Supreme Court has declared. Howev-er, recently the Court of Appeal affirmed this right with the condition that the Government decides how these rights are used. This now opens a big debate between Government & the Indigenous People for more talk on why we should or shouldn’t drill for oil on their lands. The Maya Leaders Alliance has been very vocal, stepping up their campaign for Government to respect their right to commu-nal land. But what they fail to realize is that while they have a right to the land, the Gov-ernment has ownership of petroleum, min-erals and accompanying substances found anywhere on or under the territory of Belize.

US Capital Energy Belize Ltd is preparing to drill for oil very soon, as preliminary phases have been completed. This company has in-vested millions of dollars in preparation for the different phases. This company has also invested millions of dollars in our education sector, in the cultural sector and many others. They have contributed greatly so far in devel-oping this district. But is that enough? Will the success of drilling for oil in Sarastoon Temash outweigh the alternative of not drilling, thus preserving the lands? Will the people of Be-lize greatly benefit from the royalties collect-ed from the company? Will Toledo gets if fair share of development, educational and eco-nomic wise? Or will just a “select few” ben-efit from this?

That brings us to the people of Toledo. We are very poor, financially, but we are rich with natural resources. However, we are not utilizing these resources properly to receive the greatest benefit. I honestly think that if US Capital Energy Belize drills for oil in a sustain-able manner and helps to “spark” the Toledo economy, then yes, it would be outstanding! The Indigenous People must come together and decide their future: should we agree to support the oil company that would aid us in providing jobs and future economic develop-ment? Or should we preserve our lands for future generations of traditional living? The question is: will the future generations want

to live on traditional lands, and occupying tra-ditional ways of life? Or will they prefer living in the cities and sporting urban features?

I am very sure that US Capital Energy Belize Limited has good intentions to help the local Toledo economy. They have been doing quite good this far, in providing jobs, and regulating the economy. The big ques-tion I ask again is: will the success of drilling for oil in Sarastoon Temash outweigh the al-ternative of not drilling, thus preserving the lands?

This I leave for you to decide as I am not an oil expert. This is only an objective analy-sis on my part.

Respectfully,Kenny JacobsExecutive Director/TV HostTeens Belize Organization/Developing

Toledo TV Show

Barrow claims he “doesn’t know” about Rosewood fiasco, Fresh Pond land hustling, nor

Buckley’s woes

Belize City, August 7, 2013Prime Minister Dean Bar-

row played “passam” when he dodged tough questions from the media over the numerous scandals facing the UDP Gov-ernment.

When asked about the lat-est Rosewood fiasco and the Minister of Forestry Lisel Ala-milla’s scandalous undersell-ing of containers of the prized lumber for a pittance while the well-connected UDP export-er laughed all the way to the bank, the Prime Minister said he hadn’t checked with the Minister to find out how she came up with her figures, and so he could not give a proper response.

When cross-examined about the land/house grab in the Fresh Pond housing area involving well-known UDP cro-nies attached to the Minister of Housing Michael Finnegan and Deputy Prime Minister, the PM said he didn’t see anything wrong.

In fact, when asked about the brawl that nearly broke out between supporters of the two political elephants, after they were grabbing the same hous-es and lots, Barrow said it was perfectly in order. Don Gapi’s cronies, including his driver, have been grabbing up aban-doned houses at the Fresh Pond housing site. Finnegan’s hustlers have also been eye-ing the same properties, and it resulted in a showdown when Finnegan’s CEO Lawrence Sylvester marched up to the Ministry of Lands’ office to query about the status of the land transfers. Sylvester was kicked out of the office.

Incredibly, Barrow even admitted that his sister, who is his campaign manager, was eyeing the same house Vega’s

driver was.And while Barrow’s

lack of awareness of the Ministerial scandals seemed too abnormal for a man who runs the Cab-inet like Morsi, his excus-es for not knowing about the case of Mesopotamia resident Steven Buckley is outrightly incredible and shameful.

“I don’t know about the details…” he cried out at first, when asked why Buckley had not re-ceived compensation for the injuries he sustained

after a Police Officer shot him in April 2010.

Yet, he confessed knowing that Buckley had been “horribly wounded and incapacitated and disfigured”. He also offered a legal opinion, saying that “Mis-ter Buckley appears to be em-inently entitled to significant compensation”. And then he fum-bled, confused again, “But again I don’t know”.

The case has been a thorn in the Barrow Administration’s side for three long years. Buckley has done just about everything to get the Ministry of National Security to compensate him for his injuries. He has pleaded on talk shows, shared his tragic story on news-casts and has even blistered his feet with countless walk-in vis-its to the Police Station. None of these actions had any effect from the cold and heartless UDP Gov-ernment.

It’s been three long and hard years for Buckley, who even re-sorted to begging in downtown Belize City because he could not work.

Barrow pretended to know nothing about it, and his reaction to a question asking how longer it would take for justice, was his greatest act so far.

Barrow said, “Dah two years ago? Well I am sorry, I am left speechless… Lord man, if this happened two years ago and we can’t come to terms with com-pensating this man for the wan-ton destruction almost for his life, then something is wrong. That dah noh justice; that is not fair play.”

For the record Prime Minister, it’s been two years and an entire election since. Barrow seems to be living in the clouds, or too busy machinating his next legal bat-tle for his family to make money from, to worry about the cries and problems of poor Belizeans.

Page 30: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 30

EDiTORiAl Español

Amandala y Propaganda UDP

Dean Barrow es el actual Ministro de Finanzas. Él hace lo que quiere con el dinero del pais. El personalmente ha aprobado millones de dólares de fondos del Gobierno a su ex esposa Lois Young Barrow. Millones de dólares se han pagado al bufete de abogados de Lois Young Barrow, en donde la hija de Dean Barrow también trabaja. Este dinero pagado a Lois por servicios legales realizado

podría haberse ahorrado ya que ese trabajo está dentro de las funciones del Procurador General y su equipo de abogados. Lo que Dean Barrow ha hecho es demostrar su nepotismo en su peor forma: enriqueciendo a su familia.

Lois Young Barrow ahora es la embajadora en Washington, EE.UU, vivi-endo en grandeza a costa de los contribuyentes, recibiendo gratis los beneficios médicos y de otros.

Como Ministro de Finanzas, Dean Barrow ha venido aprobando fuertes sumas de dinero de los contribuyentes como pago a su hermano, Denys Barrow, por servicios legales que por ley abogados de la procuraduría deberían estar haciendo. Aún no se sabe si el hermano Denys ha logrado alcanzar los dos o tres millones, pero seguro que los millones serán múltiples al momento que Dean Barrow sea expulsado del gobierno en las próximas elecciones donde tendrá que responder por sus delitos de despilfarro.

Lo que Dean Barrow está haciendo está facilitando el enriqueciendo a su hermano Denys de la manera más vergonzosa de las finanzas escasos de los con-tribuyentes, fondos que se necesitan con urgencia para ayudar a los estudiantes solventar aumentos en matrícula y otros gastos de la educación secundaria y terciaria.

Dean Barrow, en su capacidad como Primer Ministro, nombro la persona más inadecuada como embajador musical de Belice. Su hijo, ahora conocido como Moisés Levi, o Shyne, o Jamal. Este inadaptado es un convicto criminal que pasó ocho años en una cárcel estadounidense antes de ser forzado a Belice a través de deportación. Él ahora vive en Israel, en un enorme costo para los contribuyentes de Belice. La Corte Suprema recientemente lo declaró culpable de ejecutar una enorme factura de arrendamiento en Belice que se ha negado a pagar. Bajo las leyes de Belice cualquier funcionario público, embajador o ministro, que hace una cosa así debe renunciar. La excepción es, por supuesto, “Shyne” Barrow.

Dean Barrow como Ministro de Finanzas retiró el Boledo y loterías del control gubernamental en el que ha estado desde 1940 y se lo entregó a un compinche UDP “Brads”. Se alega que Anwar Barrow hijo de Barrow, Anwar, es un socio anónimo de Brads. Esto es una acusación grave y requiere que el Primer Ministro admite o desmienta tal a través de un informe a la nación. Tal revelación es el mínimo de un gobierno que prometió la rendición de cuentas y la transparencia. El Boledo y Lotería es un portador de un fondo millonario que debería ser administrado por una agencia de gobierno y canalizar ganancias a través de programas sociales.

Dean Barrow como Ministro de Finanzas ha dirigido la administración más corrupta. La lista es demasiado larga para contar en detalles aquí. El tráfico humano facilitado en la trata de Chinos e Indios pasan a través de Belice en su recorrido a los EE.UU. Estas personas aportan visas aprobadas por el Departa-mento de Inmigración por medio de un grupo de facilitadores que son cómplices del partido UDP que obtienen una cuota de visas aprobadas mensualmente.

Los servicios médicos cuentan con un presupuesto de varios millones de dólares para medicamentos. Este presupuesto es como una piñata para los astutos cómplices UDP. Altos funcionarios del Ministerio de Salud son culpables de usar fondos de los contribuyentes para comprar medicamentos de calidad inferior, que se re-venden al Ministerio a precios lucrativos. Esto es crimen organizado. Como el director general en el Ministerio de Salud, Peter Allen debe decirle a la nación quienes son los quienes integran la compañía “secreta” que suministra estos medicamentos al ministerio.

Belice es considerado un importante país de tránsito de drogas. Metanfe-tamina y seudoefedrina se han desparramado a través del país por la aduana en contenedores de carga, destinados a México y los EE.UU. Narco aviones y traficantes de drogas estrechamente vinculados con el UDP han estado funcio-

nando en sus niveles más concurridas. Un individual que se encontraba dentro de la familia UDP, cerca del político Viceprimer Ministro fue detenido por la DEA. Otro importante financista del UDP está ahora en una cárcel mexicana por tráfico de drogas.

La corrupción en el Ministerio de Tierras es leyenda. Incluso una materia inofensiva como Rosewood ha sido un gran producto básico para negocios turbios de cómplices UDP y ministros UDP con la plena bendición de Dean Barrow, Primer Ministro y Ministro de Hacienda.

Dean Barrow como primer ministro fue escuchado ofrecer una expli-cación poco convincente en cuanto a cómo fue regalado a su sobrino Kimano Barrow, un simple técnico en computación, con miles de acres de tierra para la exploración de petróleo.

Un entonces chaval humilde de Port Loyola ahora es el orgulloso dueño de decenas de mansiones de dos y tres niveles, desde que se convirtió en un min-istro de Dean Barrow. Así también existe una Senadora más grande que la vida.

No se ha ofrecido explicación sobre la forma que la actual esposa del Primer Ministro puede aceptar cientos de miles de dólares pertenecientes a los contribuyentes para proyectos gubernamentales aprobados, como donación a un fondo privado. ¿No fue él quien puso en marcha un proceso penal contra el ex Primer Ministro, quien pagó un préstamo médico con fondos donados para otro proyecto? ¿Dean Barrow, Primer Ministro y Ministro de Finanzas ha perdido su brújula moral?

En todo esto turbio y la corrupción, los beliceños han quedado cada día más pobre. La vida se ha vuelto más difícil, mucho más difícil.

¿Y dónde está el principal periódico, el Amandala, en todo esto? Ocupados Editorializando y atacando al ex primer ministro. Tienen veintinueve editoriales atacando contra Rt. Excmo. Said Musa. No hemos encontrado ni siquiera un editorial contra el primer ministro Dean Barrow. El récord habla por sí mismo. Said Musa no ha estado en el gobierno durante cinco años. Sin embargo, sigue siendo el blanco de los ataques viciosos del Amandala. Le han dado rienda suelta a Barrow con paso libre. De hecho, Barrow ha sido coronado como un héroe y un nacionalista por sus nuevos defensores y colaboradores encontrados.

Cuando el “nacionalista” Barrow repartió millones de dólares de impuestos a sus abanderados de partido, el Amandala no lo vio como nada malo y no escribió ni un editorial. Cuando el “nacionalista” relleno la lista de votantes en 2012 con miles de votantes extranjeros solo para poder ganar las elecciones, un editorial Amandala, admirando, explicó que era parte de un fenómeno mundial de la migración. Cuando pequeños bebés continuaban muriendo en el Orange Walk, Toledo y hospitales de la Ciudad de Belice, Amandala editorializo que los servicios de salud están en favor de los pobres. Ni una palabra de condena.

Como van incrementando los editoriales cada vez más en contra de Francis Fonseca y nos preguntamos el motivo del Amandala. Nos preguntamos también, la ausencia absoluta de un solo editorial o del editor que ofrezca una explicación sobre Mark Espat y Cordel Hyde.

¿Por qué? Nos preguntamos, días después de las elecciones generales de 2012 Dean Barrow nombrara a Mark Espat y Cordel Hyde como embajador especial.

¿Cómo? Nos preguntamos, ¿Podría un gran roedor político y lo peor traidor político de Belice no reciba ninguna mención en el periódico más grande? Es cierto que había un editorial para explicar que el PUP perdió las elecciones de 2012 por dos asientos, pero no ha habido un análisis de las razones verdaderas, ya que tendrían que hablar del traidor. No ha habido ninguna mención de la historia de Mark Espat de sabotear el PUP y en el proceso de venta a la gente pobre de este país.

Ahora es agosto de 2013, cinco años y medio después que Said Musa perdió las elecciones generales. Es una conveniente distracción para atacar a Musa mientras Barrow enriquece su familia y su gobierno mantiene a los pobres en una situación de pobreza perenne. El X se ha convertido en un jugador impor-tante en el juego de Barrow.

Amandala, el periódico, la televisión y la radio están inundados de anuncios relacionados con el gobierno y el gobierno, los anuncios y la página completa de propaganda UDP. El pueblo puede ser pobres, pero no son ciegos.

¡Poder al pueblo!

Page 31: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES11 AUG 2013 31

Foul mouth Finnegan!

Continued from page 1

CA

RTO

On

Unitedville resident almost beaten to death

Unitedville, Cayo District, August 2, 2013

33 year old Elon Gon-gora is in a critical but stable condition at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital after he was viciously attacked by a group of machete wielding men two weeks ago in the village of Unitedville, Cayo District.

Gongora’s mother Jo-sephine Gongora and aunt, Martha Jones-Andrews were livid when they visited the BELIZE TIMES last week to explain why they blame UDP Chairman Mike Juan for the brutal attack.

According to the victim’s mother, the UDP Chairman encourages idleness in the community and it has influ-enced the young male resi-dents in the most negative of ways.

Gongora said the UDP Chairman is known for giving out liquor and starting drink-ing parties. These parties almost always end violently, according to the Unitedville matriarch.

Gongora’s son was at-tacked as he went to one of those impromptu drinking parties to investigate a report that his brother had been chopped.

The incident occurred on Friday July 26th night. Gon-gora’s brother, Julian Cadle, was hanging out at a place

known as “Sammy’s Shop” when he got in to a fight with an individual. He was attacked with a machete, and suffered a chop wound to his foot. When Gongora showed up, he was attacked by a gang of three men who were armed with machetes and bats.

Gongora was badly beat-en before he was able to escape by running away. His clothes was soaked in blood and could barely stand up. He was taken to the Loma Luz Hospital in San Ignacio and then to the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital where a large cut on his head was closed with 36 stitches. He has had to undergo three separate cat scans to deter-mine the extent of the inju-ries to his head.

Gongora also sustained a chop wound to his left wrist and upper left arm. His right hand thumb was broken and he has bruises all over his body.

The trio accused of the attack were held for question-ing by the Police, but were re-leased after a certain attorney showed up on Mike Juan’s behalf. They have not been detained nor charged since.

“I feel very angry. Someone must be held re-sponsible for what they did to my son,” said Gongora.

She said Mike Juan has

been encouraging crime in the community with his irrespon-sible acts.

“Mike Juan must get out and stop destroying the lives of the children in our community,” she said.

Gongora remains hospi-talised up to today. His family are optimistic about his recu-peration, but are concerned about the mounting medical bills.

Belize City, August 7, 2013

Member from Meso-potamia Michael Finnegan should face tough disci-plinary action for his most unparliamentary conduct at Wednesday’s sitting of the House of Representa-tives.

Finnegan, who is known for being disre-

spectful and rude every time he speaks, crossed the line once again when he disrespected the only woman in the House, the member from Belize Rural Central Hon. Dolores Bal-deramos Garcia.

Hon. Dolores had stood up to raise a serious con-cern table. The concern was over the criminal-like

conduct of UDP thug, Macebearer Brian “Yellow-man” Audinette, who is facing criminal charges for brutally attacking a Police Officer and well-known ac-tivist Phillip “Faada” Hen-ry. Audinette has also been caught and exposed by the BELIZE TIMES in the most compromising of situations, including drinking in public outside the National Assem-bly and urinating in plain view of the public near a pri-mary school.

Despite these exposés, Yellowman remains an em-ployee and officer of the House of Assembly with full salary and benefits. He even continues to mindlessly drive around a National Sports Council vehicle, fuelled with taxpayer’s monies.

Hon. Dolores called into question this conduct and was hoping for answers, but instead of saying how the Na-tional Assembly would correct the wrongdoings, Finnegan began hurling vile invectives at the PUP Deputy Leader. His comments were offensive, es-

pecially when he asked the Honorable member “if she had seen his [Yellowman’s] size”. Finnegan’s asinine be-havior is uncalled for and it is high time he is castigated for his actions.

It is not the first time that Finnegan’s dirty mouth drools drivel. Belizeans could recall his last insult of former Speaker of the House Honorable Elizabeth Zabaneh. Finnegan had to apologize for that incident, but since then he has con-tinued to behave with no decorum fit for an honor-able member.

Sadly, the BELIZE TIMES predicts that Fin-negan’s foulness will go unchecked. This is be-cause the UDP thrives on taking advantage of the defenseless and vulnera-ble, especially women.

Elon’s head injury required 36 stitches

Yellowman

Page 32: Belize Times August 11, 2013

THE BELIZE TIMES 11 AUG2013 32