Faber Explains Political Melee in Red Bank

Patrick Faber

On Monday, Party Leader Patrick Faber spoke on the melee that erupted in Red Bank village over the weekend.   While he said the U.D.P. secretariat was awaiting the outcome of an investigation conducted by the police department, he gave an account which suggested that the party’s supporters were the ones attacked by the opposition. 

Patrick Faber, Party Leader, U.D.P.

“We also at this time would like to speak on the matter of election violence and we’ve seen some of this erupt over the weekend and we want to caution our supporters, appeal to them, of course we make the wider appeal to all Belizeans no matter what political persuasion you follow to let us keep this election very civil, very peaceful.  As I am told, yesterday in Red Bank Village a group of our campaigners they were agitated, they were baited by members of the opposition and supporters of the opposition interfering with flags and posters that were on a vehicle and of course that caused some problems that ended up in a police officer firing two warning shots after machetes came out from some of these folks who were harassing our supporters.  Now we don’t want to get into the kind of back and forth that that can bring, so I will ask all our supporters and we know that it is a very, very critical time political wise and we know that the U.D.P. is the incumbent and we will be baited on many occasions. We await the statement that he gave to the police and the investigation of the police for us to be absolutely certain but the shots were not fired by any supporters of the United Democratic Party, let me be clear.  And from what I was told, those shots were fired by a police officer.”