CitCo looks East for garbage truck donation

Ralston Frazer

A first of its kind grant assistance from the Grassroots and Human Security Program of the Embassy of Japan will gift residents of Belmopan their own new garbage contractor truck. The grant of just over one hundred and seventy-five thousand Belize dollars was presented in the Garden City by Japanese Embassy Counselor Shinichi Yamanaka Deputy Mayor Ralston Frazer, acting for absent Mayor Khalid Belisle. Frazer told reporters that the money alleviates a particular problem for the capital, and takes advantage of a new friendship with the Far East country.

Ralston Frazer, Acting Mayor, Belmopan

“The grassroots program for the improvement of humanity is on the Japanese side. We have a colleague within the Council here, Mr. Philip Timmons, who had had the opportunity to visit with them in Japan some time ago; on his return, he started communication and continued to this point. We had come to a point where we realized that our garbage truck was just not working for us; in fact, we had gotten to the point where got two of the old ones and put them together to make one and that one is now gone. We had gone to the point where we had lobbied with Mayor [Darrell] Bradley, from Belize City, and at some points had borrowed his trucks and so forth. But we are at this point where Mr. Timmons had been communicating with the Embassy of Japan, based in Jamaica, to help us with a grant for us to make this possible, and that is the fruition of what we see today.”