ComPol on Election Day Curfew

Chester Williams

As you know, as of nine p.m. on Wednesday night, a countrywide curfew kicks in.  Today, ComPol Williams told the press that police officers will be making sure that the public complies with the curfew, but that they will also be making some accommodations for those who must be out, but that social gatherings will not be taken lightly.

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“We also have the fact that we are going to have a curfew on election night and again the police will enforce the curfew regulation. But at the same time, as I said, before there are certain categories of persons who must be allowed to move around during the curfew hours. Those persons who are involved in the election process, the public officers, they will be allowed to move around. You have the observers, a number of observers in the country, I think around sixty from different parts of the world who are here to witness our election process, and they too will be allowed to move around. We will also have the candidate and an agent or two of theirs who may need to act on their behalf and check on situations at different counting stations during the curfew hours and they too will be allowed to move around. And then we have the media, they too will be allowed to move around. We advise that different media house give tags to their agents in the different parts of the country so that they will be able to be identified by the police. With that, I don’t foresee, difficulty. I have said before, if hypothetically, if at nine o’clock there are persons still on the line to vote, they will be allowed to vote and go home unimpeded by the police.”

Reporter

“There may be some wanting for gatherings, even watch parties at night – do police have the numbers to man these types of activities?”

Chester Williams

“You will be surprised when you think that the police don’t have numbers, we are very good at playing chess and we always try to find the numbers to be able to police whatever event we need to police. So, yes, we are going to have the numbers and I won’t be babysitting anybody on that day. I would trust and hope that our Belizean people would understand the seriousness of the pandemic that we are dealing with.”