Council’s garbage collection debt festers
The financial woes of the Belize City Council continue to mount. There is the complaint from the Financial Controller, Patrick Tillett, that close to twenty five thousand dollars are missing from the CITCO’s coffers for which arrests are said to be expected. The debt to Sanitation Enterprises Limited is still not resolved and last week the Council was ordered to pay ninety four thousand dollars for wrongful termination of an employee. Well, today, there is one more headache to deal with—a long outstanding debt to Belize Waste Control. The debt dates back to 1997 and has been before the court since 2005. This morning in the Court of Chief Justice Abdulai Conteh, B.W.C. proceeded on a notice of final judgment to collect the monies after all these years. We spoke to City Councillor responsible for Sanitation, Phillip Willoughby, to find out the council’s position in the matter and he told us he hopes they can settle the debt before the company takes any drastic measures such as crow footing of their assets as in the S.E.L. case. So just how large is this debt that has been growing interest and damages for over ten years? That’s what we asked Willoughby today.
Philip Willoughby, City Councillor
“I can tell you based on the award, the award is saying that damages be paid to the claimant in the sum of four hundred thousand dollars for the breach of section two of the contract dated the fourth of December 1997 so do the maths and see what kind of damages and interest is there from 1997 to current would be. Damages be paid to the claimant in the sum of seven hundred and eighteen thousand, five hundred and eight thousand, five hundred and thirty-one dollars for the breach of section four of the contract with interest growing at a rate of eight percent per annum from seventh June 2005 until payment. The sum of twenty-nine thousand, seven hundred and seventy-one-ninety-five be paid to the claimant as a weekly contractual price and consideration for collection of all residential solid waste and recyclable material from seventh June 2005 and the claimants based on this; this was handed down. I believe this went through a lengthy period of arbitration and so forth.”
“Then there was another one which stated that the above named defendant, not having filed the acknowledgment of service of the claim form and statement of claim herein, it is this day adjudged that the claimant recover against the said defendant the sum of forty thousand with interest on the principal sum of thirty-six thousand sixty-nine dollars, twenty-seven-twenty-eight at a daily rate of twelve dollars and two cents running from since. So I will wait to see now the calculation from the court in lieu of all the interest and all the figures that I have put out to you and including the principal of what is owing to them and then we’ll move from there.”
Willoughby says Fred Lumor, who is currently representing Belize Waste Control, brought out in court that CitCo also owes costs of court to attorney Lois Young who represented the garbage collection company in past trials against the council.
