Cabinet Ministers Bust Travel Budget

Prime Minister John Briceño

Prime Minister John Briceño is now telling his Cabinet ministers to find their own funding if they want to travel to official international events. And, for those government officials that seemingly travel abroad almost weekly to attend events, P.M. Briceño is telling them that it is not necessary to be at every event. So, effective immediately the Briceño Administration has placed a pause on international travels, except for the most important events. He explained the decision to reporters today.

Prime Minister John Briceño

“What is happen is that in many instances, for instance the previous government did not believe in going to these meetings. But, if you don’t go to these meetings, you don’t know what happens over there. You lose the opportunities to get technical assistance or even get financial assistance fort the country. But if you are not sitting around the table when the negotiations are taking place you get left out. So, what we have been doing is we have been going to these meetings. But of late i have been telling ministers two things, one that you need to get funding so we don’t, i think that budget has been used up, so if you get your own funding you will be able to go. But, secondly some ministries in particular travel more than others. I am telling them you don’t need to go to every meeting. You just need to look at the important meetings. The ministry of Sustainable Development, the issues of climate change and all of these issues that are hot button issues. They are having meetings all over the world, all the time. I was telling him i was also Minister of Natural Environment, Natural Resources; I would choose the meeting I want to go. Because, while we do not have an economic cost to Belize, you have a utility cost to Belize cause you are not in office so obviously you can’t get done all the work that needs to be finished on a timely basis.”