Leaked Audio Recording Between Former S.S.B. Chair & Journalist

The recording of an interview between Aaron Humes of Belize Breaking News and Dough Singh, formerly of the Social Security Board, has triggered a passionate debate about public accountability, the right of the public to know and journalism ethics.  Since its release, the audio recording has unleashed a storm on social media because as a senior public official, Singh made derogatory and repulsive statements about which constituents are to benefit from the COVID-19 Unemployment Relief Programme. Even though the S.S.B. is only the disbursing agency, Singh makes judgmental comments about women, whom he said are “Murillo’s baby daddies,” referring to those men behind bars. That interview, we are told, was shared by Humes with his colleagues and then leaked.  Notably, there was no mention of off the record comments during the course off the nineteen-minute interview. For us, the question is not who leaked the information, but what was said and how is it that as a media house we can report bravely on issues of national importance without breaking the trust of the public and face repercussions such as loss of access to valuable public information.

Audrey Matura

Audrey Matura, Attorney-at-law

“When I heard the content of the interview at the very start, I will not tell you any lie, my jaw dropped. I wasn’t even sure I was hearing right. I repeated this interview several times to be sure. I know Mister Singh’s voice very good; I know how he likes to talk. I never realised he uses so many curse words. Well obviously he has never spoken to me like that. But let’s look at the content of what he said. The reason Mister Humes was entitled to call him and ask him for a comment is because he is ultimately the person in charge of disbursing the money. The disrespect that was even greater was that Mister Singh forgot that he’s talking to a poor black man from the south side because although Aaron has a job, he’s not the wealthiest person. And then Aaron uses his own family as an example and the insult is very clear because it is people like his mother and father that the ex-chairman low rated and berated and so that tells you that for me, the accountability is not saying how money is being spent, but even your character: how you hold that office, how you represent that office, how you view people that you are there to serve because he is there to serve. And that is a lie that he is saying that we are getting something for free and then began cursing. We are not getting anything for free. Somebody pays it. Even the poor person who is not employed in the formal system, every time they go buy something even if it just ramen or they go buy some product that they pay GST on, they are contributing to the taxes. And those are the taxes that keeps Mister Singh very comfortably paid in any post or position that he gets that is political appointed. So he needs to be accountable to us. He lives off the public purse so you answer to the public. So that’s my message to him. And congratulations to him on his resignation; he did the right thing.”