Debate cancelled, parties point fingers
It was to be the biggest political face off in the nation’s history: Prime Minister Said Musa behind one podium…Leader of the Opposition, Dean Barrow behind the other. But that debate, originally scheduled for next week, is officially off. What went wrong? Well, according to a press release issued by the organisers, the Belize Business Bureau and the Belize Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the parties could not agree on fundamental issues. Since the release does not elaborate on those irreconcilable differences, this afternoon we put the question to campaign managers from both parties. Not surprisingly, each one blames it on the other.
Audrey Wallace, U.D.P. Campaign Manager
“Our party leader did not want to have the questions in advance. The Prime Minister on the other hand, not only did he want the questions in advance, but those questions had to be agreed on by both political parties. In addition to that, they did not want to have rebuttals. So in our estimation that was not a debate, and we felt that we would be doing the Belizean people a disservice by having that sort kind of stage performance.”
“In our opinion, we believe that the Prime Minister is running away from a debate with the Honourable Dean Barrow because it did not have to be such a complicated process to agree on certain terms and conditions for a debate.”
Janelle Chanona
“Now some would say that the U.D.P. had more to gain from this debate than the People’s United Party, would you agree with that?”
Audrey Wallace
“I cannot agree with that. All over the world we have leaders, presidents, debate on issues, and of course it may appear sometimes that the incumbent has that disadvantage. But I believe if you are the leader of a country, you’d be able to stand up for any debate and be able to handle that. So I don’t think that is an issue Janelle. If we are going to, from now on, in this country as part of the political process have debates, at some point you maybe the one who is the incumbent. So I think that’s ridiculous. I don’t think there’s really any disadvantage or advantage.”
Eamon Courtenay, Deputy Natl. Campaign Manager, P.U.P.
“I am saying had that debate gone off, Prime Minister Musa would have won that debate hands down, that’s what I’m saying. Both Ms. Wallace and I, as well as the organizers, have very tight schedules. We sat down at the very beginning and set up the dates and times for meetings, which we stuck to. The second to last meeting, Ms. Wallace and I expressed serious concern to the committee, saying they were setting up the final meeting for one o’clock for yesterday and at that time, if we had not finished everything that it would be off. We therefore requested them to provide us with the topics and any outstanding issues before that. Ms. Wallace was away, out of the country for two day, that again became a problem. I had other campaign commitments, that was also a problem. When we got there yesterday, we didn’t have any moderator, they didn’t have any moderator, the people who they had checked with had declined to moderate the debate, they didn’t have the topics settled, and there was no time. They proposed that deadline, both parties agreed. Ms. Wallace, I’m sure she has told you, had indicated that they had already set the day when their Party Leader was going to be practicing and preparing for the debate, we had already programmed that around the commitments that Prime Minister Musa had, and so I think both sides accepted that, well listen, if it can’t be done yesterday, that’s it, it’s off.”
The electronic media, including all major radio and television stations, had already agreed to carry the debate live and commercial free as a public service. A similar attempt to organise a debate in 1998 also ended in failure.
