Belize joins Central American anti-drug group
For years, the policy of the United States government in its war against drugs has been to publicly applaud or shame the countries of the Americas in a process called certification. Belize is no stranger to the bad list and with that in mind, this week Belize and other Central American nations successfully lobbied with the Bush administration to lift the tactic in lieu of another idea called M.E.M., the Multilateral Evaluation Mechanism. The program is just one initiative of the Permanent Central American Committee, the body spearheading anti-drug activities in the region. Ornel Brooks, the Executive Director of the National Drug Abuse Control Council, is currently M.E.M.’s vice chairman and this afternoon, he told News 5 what the new strategy entails.
Ornell Brooks, Executive Dir., NDACC
“What the M.E.M. seeks to do, rather than decertifying or certifying countries, the M.E.M. evaluates and informs countries of their readiness and state of preparedness in fighting the drugs in a co-ordinated and co-operative effort across the hemisphere.”
“Each recommendation represents a weakness or a deficiency. I think Belize had about nine to ten deficiencies. But let me say here that was in the lower level or deficiencies among other nations.”
Janelle Chanona
“So what areas do we have to work on?”
Ornell Brooks
“We have to be able to tighten our national enforcement effort, there has to be greater co-ordination among all entities that deals with the drug problem, including education, media, schools, the library services and also law enforcement and the judiciary. In additional to that, we have got to perform a little better on the international scene where co-operation and co-ordination is concerned.”
Jose Coye, Minister of Health
“But one of the weaknesses, certainly within the region on a whole is the question of information. How do you get the information to make more intelligent decisions and to put your resources to more efficient use; and I think we’ll agree that information is the key. So what the countries of the region are doing, is firstly, we’re preparing for what they call the Transnational Digital Government, the networking of information. But how do we begin to network information if individually we’re already weak in gathering the data, transmitting that data into information, useful information for intelligent decision and the better use of resources? Is that the country’s individual we need to develop the observatories lab where they’re able to collect data, translate that into useful information and then we can share it.”
The pilot program for the Transnational Digital Government Research Project will be implemented in Belize, under the co-ordination of the University of Belize and NDACC. The project is funded by the United States National Science Foundation, the Dominican Republic and the Organisation of American States.
