National Assembly Plans Busy December: 4 Meetings in 15 Days

A busy December in the Legislature is being planned, with a House and Senate meeting scheduled around two meetings of the Special Senate Select Committee on Immigration, all in the first fifteen days of the month before the Christmas break. Clerk of the National Assembly Eddie Webster informs that on December seventh, the Committee hosts Auditor General Dorothy Bradley at nine a.m. to continue her testimony on the three-volume Special Audit Report on Immigration, Visas and Passports, 2011-2013. A second meeting is scheduled for December fourteenth. The House meets on December ninth, the day planned for ratification of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption; Prime Minister Dean Barrow is expected to sign the Convention at his Belize City office beforehand. All eyes will be on Cayo South area representative Julius Espat and Speaker of the House Michael Peyrefitte, to see if the men mend fences or if Espat is even allowed back into the House following the ugly and contentious ending to the last meeting of the Lower House on August twenty-sixth, when Espat was “named” by Minister of Foreign Affairs and Pickstock representative Wilfred Elrington, alleging unparliamentary language, and was dragged out by police, who also mishandled a few members of the press. The full Senate concludes its business for 2016 on December fifteenth.