Former U.D.P. Minister says GOB actions are criminal

Hubert Elrington

As you know by now, the Prime Minister says the government will re-nationalize Belize Telemedia on Monday. That’s because its re-nationalization in 2009 has been found by the Court of Appeal to be unconstitutional, null and void. The government has not given back the company to its owners saying the ruling was of a declaratory nature and an order is required for enforcement. That’s the PM’s take, but Attorney Hubert Elrington, a man known not to mince words and who shoots from the hip, differs totally from that view. Elrington is a former UDP Minister who was law partner with the current attorney general and is the brother of the current Foreign Minister. In short, Elrington has high credentials. He says that the disregard for a court ruling is tantamount to contempt of court and that the use of the security forces to forcefully keep representatives of the owners away from the company is an abuse of office and that’s criminal. Elrington gave an analogy using a case of a person illegally occupying a neighbor’s property.

Hubert Elrington, Attorney

“Maybe they honestly believed that they had acquired, but the Court of Appeal said no, you made a mistake. It was a blunder, it belongs to the owners. So there was a declaration of ownership. Now, if I am on this property, honestly believing that the property is mine, I am on it in good faith. I honestly believe it is mine and the court says no, it belongs to your neighbor. Does the court have to do anything else beside tell me that I’m on my neighbor’s property? The court has said to the government of Belize in the clearest terms, you are on your neighbor’s property. What did the government do? Right away they started to come through the fence, they came through the gate, they ran through the back door; right away they left their neighbors property. It was a bit unseemly, humorous, but it was the right thing to do. Then they second taught, they said no we will go back, we will stay on our neighbor’s property and we are going to order—this is where it gets criminal in my view, this is where the action of the Cabinet becomes a criminal action in my view—we are going to order the Commissioner of Police and we are going to order the Commandant of the B.D.F. to enforce our rights as trespassers.  Once they arrive at what the Court of Appeal decision means, they are duty bound to obey it because it is of the first constitutional importance. Nothing is more important in our country. Nothing can be more important. It’s like the death sentence of the country, not the death sentence of a person. This raises the spectrum of the death sentence of our country because either we are a country that will govern ourselves by the rule of law or we are going to try and brush aside the rule of law and have disrespect for the law.”

We’ll have more of the candid interview with Elrington later in the newscast.