Chester to Rain on Parties & Illegal Events

As most Belizeans prepare to usher in 2022 in a far more subdued way than they had hoped, the Commissioner of Police is cautioning those who do plan to party like its 2019 to hold it down. He says just because you don’t think you are going to get COVID, the police will be enforcing all protocols to protect others in the community. He even went as far as calling out specific businesses advertising illegal parties, saying the police will be watching.  

Chester Williams

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“We can see that some people are still selfish and they are only concerned about themselves and making money and seemingly they want to forget that we are still in a time of pandemic. And so what I have done is send out a press release to remind the public that we are still in a time of pandemic and the police will be enforcing the COVID-19 regulation, particularly the aspect of it that deals with social event, parties and the wearing of facemasks. Everybody is seeing what the omicron variant is doing around us and while yes, we are not sure if it is already in Belize, we can see that it is a more contagious strand of the COVID-19 virus.  And if it is here, it takes one person at one of those events to spread it so rapidly across this country. And as Belizeans, we must be cautious. While yes, there are some who believe that they are young and strong and not afraid of COVID-19, we still have to be mindful of the most vulnerable around us and we must act in defence of them. And so those illegal parties being advertised and I can call out the name of some of those places so that the public can know – we have Social Lounge in Belize City; Alaia in San Pedro; we have Losers Bar in San Pedro, we have Sunset Bar in San Pedro. I think I see one with Aba Iseni – I don’t know if that is in Belize City or Dangriga, but there are a number of them.”