Shyne Barrow: The U.D.P. Supports Acquisition of Port But Question Reasons

Moses Shyne Barrow

Leader of the Opposition, Moses Shyne Barrow told reporters that while he and his colleagues on the opposition support the re-acquisition of the Port of Belize, he believes that the government is doing it for the wrong reasons. He also feels that the government was not completely transparent with the details of the acquisition.

Moses Shyne Barrow, Leader of the Opposition

“My colleagues and myself are not against acquisition. You look at the cost of the acquisition, it would have been better if the government would have not been this in the dark, in the middle of the night, governance, in the way that they went about this, sharing the information helps to allay any suspicion, to allay any aspersions. But we got no information. We got the information yesterday and then we got booklets of the deeds this morning. So it’s difficult to be able to see without speaking to experts, was this really valued because they’re claiming that it was valued at 500 million and they got everything done to 200 million. But again, I have to be consistent with the UDP practice of nationalization. We believe that we should own our national assets. And so in the same fashion as in BTL and BEL where we acquired our national assets and I remember Prime Minister Barrow saying that there was no cost too high to pay for what belonged to the Belizean people. It was the PUP that sold our ports to a private entity. And so, I support the acquisition.”