FECTAB Holds a 1 Man Press Conference

The Federation of Cruise Tourism Associations of Belize (FECTAB) is taking on the cause for the construction of a cruise port in Belize City. Tom Greenwood was a one-man show today at the Radisson Hotel’s VIP Room as he appeared without colleagues Yhony Rosado and David Almendarez. But he was no less vocal as he continued to press the case for establishing a cruise port in Belize City sooner rather than later. According to Greenwood, the best chance of that happening is at Stake Bank, the project sponsored by the Feinstein Group which has approval from Government and a majority of the industry but is presently tangled in legal intrigue. The fly in the ointment is the extended contract granted to Royal Caribbean Cruise Line and Diamonds International for exclusivity as a port of entry in the Belize District. Greenwood is of the opinion that it is mainly a legal problem that can and should be fixed. President Greenwood said thousands of industry workers would be seriously hurt if, as expected in 2016, Belize loses status as a result of not having a docking facility for the larger Oasis-class ships expected to be coming here. He says the problem will eventually affect Belize’s whole tourism image if nothing is done about it.

Tom Greenwood

Tom Greenwood, President, FECTAB

“We are saying that the legal people responsible for drafting that contract were working for the government of Belize; they were being paid tax payers dollars. Fix it! Go in there and fix it! I am told by some of the best legal heads in this country that any contract can be fixed, any contract can be fixed. This is why we have legal people, so fix it. Make this happen otherwise tens of thousands of people and an entire industry will pay the price. The contract as it is with the FSTV did not protect the government of Belize and certainly it did not protect the stakeholders. Stake Bank must proceed if the cruise industry is to survive within the Belize District; it must proceed. Beyond a shadow of doubt, the flight of foreign exchange out of Belize lies completely in the hands of flawed systems of investment in Belize. It is flawed. The moment you allow people to come to Belize and do as they please, it is flawed. And we have seen evidence of that constantly…over and over again. Well we have been told by our sister organization, COLA, that a demonstration will be taking place within the tourism zone against the FSTV and all that it stands for in terms of making cruise tourism more open and available to the people of Belize rather than a single little grouping. And we are certainly supporting that one hundred, one thousand percent and we are going to move in that direction. It is obvious that we as a people—and this we also involves FECTAB and all its members—must now begin to grasp this bull by the horns. We can’t continue holding on to that bull by the tail.”