Belize and Cuba reach agreement on municipal issues

Various agreements were reached today between Belize and Cuba that will further assist Belizeans to access opportunities in health, education, sports and agriculture. A new area, in which both countries agreed to cooperate, deals with issues that affect municipalities. The two countries wrapped up today the eleventh Mixed Commission which is the mechanism that reviews and sets the stage for new programmes of cooperation between Belize and Cuba.

Wilfred Elrington, Minister of Foreign Affairs
“We are thankful and very grateful for this very active and very fruitful cooperation agreement between Belize and Cuba. Education is the foundation for development; Cuba is helping us in this foundation area. We need to be eternally grateful to the Cubans.”

Alexis Rosado, C.E.O., Foreign Affairs
“Today we have a memorandum of understanding which we sign every time we hold the mixed commission; Cuba and Belize. It’s held every year and this year really what we are achieving is a renewal of the relationship. This one is a cooperation agreement that covers a wide range of areas from health to sports, to culture, education, archives; a whole wide are of cooperation.”

Jose Sanchez
“Cuba has its own set of problems such as the United States imposed embargo and you still come to help Belize for so many years now. Why?”

Orlando Requeijo Cual, Cuba’s Vice Min. of Foreign Investment & Economic Coop.
“Because we have the possibility to do it. we have nothing exceed, we have no excess but things we have, we have the possibility to share with countries all over the world so we have he possibility to do it. Our people have been created in a spirit of solidarity, of friendship; not only with Belize but with many countries around the world this is a possibility. When we have the capability to something, for us it’s a great pleasure and a great honour to contribute to the development of other people around the world. This is why.”

Jose Sanchez
“Does Cuba expect anything in return from Belize?”

Orlando Requeijo Cual
“As I mentioned in my final presentation, that also from Belize we are receiving the possibility to train Cuban people here every year. So ten scholarships have been granted to Cuban people to come to Belize in order to learn and to train themselves in the English language. So this is the kind of cooperation that Belize has been offering to Cuba since many, many years; more than fifteen years we have been operating in that way. So this is a cooperation that is in two ways.”

Alexis Rosado, C.E.O., Foreign Affairs
“Our Mayors Association felt quite excited this time around and they wanted to do something for themselves. What they are doing for themselves is they want to learn best practices.”

Jose Sanchez
“Are you going to invite the Mayors association to Cuba?”

Orlando Requeijo Cual
“We have already invited the Mayors Association to participate in one international event we are holding in Cuba on the twenty-ninth and the thirtieth of the coming September in rode to asses and to evaluate the programme that we’ve been developing in Cuba the last ten years about the development of human development issues in the communities level. So we would like to show, not only to the Mayors Association of Belize, but to many people around the world. They are coming to Cuba in order to our programmes, to get some knowledge and some possibility to adopt it for the sake of the people of Belize and other countries. So the invitation is to be forwarded through the president of the Mayors Association, Mayor Frank Mena.”

Frank Mena, President, Mayors Association
“The two main areas we have discussed have been municipal drainage and solid waste management. But in addition to that, there are some areas of cooperation that individual municipalities may have. For example, some may be socially oriented, some may be tourism or technically oriented. It will give us the opportunity for us to tie knots, to network, make further connections, to share ideas and to look at certain projects that they have at the municipal levels that we could probably emulate and see how we can adopt it and bring it to Belize.”