Activists hope to solve crime with Mission Fix Belize
nigel petillo
Aubrey Lopez, son of Belmopan’s Mayor, was laid to rest on Sunday. Several buses transported his colleagues to the funeral. The service was attended by teachers, students, and politicians, including the prime minister. His death was attributed to violence which has enveloped the country and reached crisis levels. On Friday, his friends in Belmopan organized a peaceful rally to call leaders of the country to begin to find real solutions to all that has been plaguing the country. Nigel Petillo, the organizer of Friday’s protest, said the calls have been coming from Belizean Associations throughout the United States and he has made contact with several political leaders. Now Petillo says the next step is a meeting of all stakeholders. The activist stopped by News Five this evening to inform viewers about that next step which he dubbed Mission Fix Belize.
Nigel Petillo, Organizer, Mission Fix Belize
“The Grassroots Youth Empowerment Association can positively impact the community by battling the crime that we are faced with today. We have sounded an alarm, we have called on leaders of the community; the police department, members of the church, media houses especially, the athletes who are in the community seen as icons and as positive. Di baddest ah man love di athletes, di youngest ah guys love di athletes. So we di ask you guys to come in and let us do the physical works, the physical part of this battle where we can actually go into the neighborhoods because the neighborhood will be welcoming us, versus one of those guys in gwyabera inside ah di AC setting office. We are from those communities, we can identify with the members of those communities and we want to talk about the problem. Talking about the problem means identifying the problem and so far we have sourced out to two facts. The problems in high places that we are faced with, including the parents, and the problem at the bottom the youths are being used as vessels. But we believe that by a joint effort, the community coming together, this is not about Big A wanting to get it done Big A’s way. This is about the community. But Big A has taken the opportunity to say call upon our leaders, especially Honorable Perdomo, Crispin Jeffries, who so far has been supportive of our movement. I spoke to Mister Jeffries this morning—we had a meeting with him—he is quite supportive of the movement and he will be there at the meeting. Tomorrow at the YWCA in Belize City at seven o’clock, we’re calling upon all the members of the community; the churches, all the way down to the schools as well; be a part of this tomorrow. We’re hoping to meet with especially the leaders of the community. We can only hold about fifty to eight people in the said venue but we want to have fifty to eighty influential members of the community tomorrow.”
Jose Sanchez
“Your protest earlier this week, did it reach the people you wanted to reach? Did you hear from the Prime Minister?”
Nigel Petillo
“Well, I’m sure it has reached the key people we wanted it to reach. At Aubrey’s—during his wake and funeral, I was more than happy to meet the Mayors’ Association, I got to meet with some of the teachers in the Teacher’s Union, I met with the prime minister at Aubrey’s funeral, which means a lot to me that he’s not there only because his mayor—Mayor Lopez is a member of his party—but because he has heard us, he has felt the sentiments and the anger, the sadness of the passing of Aubrey by ways of us calling up our people to demonstrate. And us walking the building three times, symbolically is saying that hey ‘think before you act; noh just pass down decisions, mek sure yoh mek decisions inclusive of di community’.”
Mission Fix Belize will be held at seven o’ clock Tuesday night at the YWCA in Belize City.
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!!!
How many more of our future need to die before this is seen as a serious problem. I say reinstate the deaht penalty for anyone convicted for murder. I have always been against capital punishment, but unless the penalty is increased, this problem will not go away. Sending these people to jail for 20 years with them serving only 1/3 of the times is not justice. As a matter of fact, I think thses kids a llooking at this as a vacation. They get all the perks that many of the working class people can not afford and at the end of the day want to riot. Jail is supposed to be a place where someone is placed for doing something wrong, but the criminal are being rewarded.
Prov. 23:10 say, “Remove not the ancient landmark … “. Let’s restore the good old discipline back before our future generation become extinct. Turn off the devil’s TV, censor the music and PLEASE realize the Belize is not America and it is not working for America. 1 in 24 person in jail is African American, and many are returning from jail HIV+. Travis 4miley in The Covenant speaks about a conspiracy of from the cradle to prison and this is exactly what we are experiencing now, our children are either in prison or in the grave. When will this end.
Something radical needs to be done and by ANY MEANS NECESSARY!
I love Belize.
God bless Belize.
Women behold thy sons. Children are a heritage from the Lord.
i will attend!
This seems to be a never-ending plague on us. We are the only ones killing & victimizing ourselves. Ninety eight percent of all crimes in BZE is committed in the city by us against us. Look around the other people them are working hard and going to skool. Now we need Petillo fi come save we.
totally agree with ECF…the behaviour of these criminals speak of cowardice, a distorted though process with perhaps no logic behind it. It is perhaps the ideas of killing, robbing you get when watching movies and well exposing ourselves to other kinds of entertainment. although there are many different factors influencing these actions from all those minors and young people committing crime, the small details also play a part…someone needs to bring back the death penalty…someone needs to do some censoring of entertainment in Belize. Clean the country of junk, whether it is entertainment, guns and even human junk…kaz that’s what some of these irrational kids have become….JUNK. let’s go back to peace…always luv Belize
As bad as we are in Belize….. It’s not as bad as Thailand, Haiti, Afghanistan, Iraq or Greece. There is MUCH HOPE for Belize….. Let’s KEEP THE HOPE ALIVE!!!!!!!!!!
Good job, Nigel Petillo!! This sounds very promising. Proud of these guys. You have the support of Belizean atheists too who believe in pragmatic solutions to our problems!
There are a lot of parents who do not give the right example to kids and who can not control the behavior or educators in school are not authorized to ‘treat’ it many kids have psychological and physiological problems, and these are magnified at home. Immorality and corruptness have a lot to do the example starts from home, you can counsel all you want but the problem needs to be followed up for years, and this can only be done at home, students change teachers year to year, consistent good discipline, showing you care, being kind and loving and even if one is poor, if the whole community helps to raise a child you will notice the difference. If you, really all want to make a difference, do not concentrate on this generation if them no change, them gone, concentrate on the kids you all have infront of you right now! If the teenagers and 20 and 30 somethings want to change (which I doubt) then they will have to learn the hard way from the university of life, and mind you if they had good parents and so on, some of them dah just bad egg.
earlgray that is so true
we still have hope
Belize can not be compared with Thailand, Haiti, Afghanistan or Iraq. The population itself says a lot; beside if everyone is doing it doesn’t make it right. GO TELL ALL THE MOTHERS WHO LOST A SON TO VIOLENCE, “let’s keep hope alive”. The only way to keep hoe alive is by correcting the problems and we may not need to have a fix more than a few, but something needs to be done.
God bless!
Sadly, the state of affairs in my beloved country and homeland is no different than that described by the Apostle Paul hundreds of years ago. How prophetic….!!
Rom 1:21 Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. The result was that their minds became dark and confused.
Rom 1:22 Claiming to be wise, they became utter fools instead.
Rom 1:23 And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols
Rom 1:24 So God let them go ahead and do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things…
Rom 1:25 Instead of believing what they knew was the truth about God, they deliberately chose to believe lies. So they worshiped the things God made but not the Creator himself, who is to be praised forever. Amen.
Rom 1:26 That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires…
Rom 1:27 … and, as a result, [they] suffered within themselves the penalty they so richly deserved.
Rom 1:28 When they refused to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their evil minds and let them do things that should never be done.
Rom 1:29 Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, fighting, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip.
Rom 1:30 They are backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They are forever inventing new ways of sinning and are disobedient to their parents.
Rom 1:32 They are fully aware of God’s death penalty for those who do these things, yet they go right ahead and do them anyway. And, worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.
BUT THERE IS HOPE, AS 11 CHRONICLES 7:14 SAYS:
“If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”
RETURN TO RIGHTEOUSNESS MY FELLOW BELIZEANS!! GOD IS STILL A GOD OF LOVE AND IS AWAITING OUR RETURN TO HIM. HE ALONE CAN SAVE AND REDEEM OUR LAND. LOOK FOR HELP NOWHERE ELSE—-BUT TO HIM. HE IS OUR REFUGE AND STRENGTH AND A VERY PRESENT HELP IN TIME OF NEED.