Mayans accuse GOB of breaking court order
It was a landmark decision in October but tonight the Mayans of southern Belize are alleging that Belmopan is deliberately ignoring their court sanctioned right to communal title of the areas surrounding their villages. According to a letter written to Minister of Natural Resources Florencio Marin and signed by officials of the Santa Cruz Village Council, this week two rural development officers informed them that on December eleventh, Marin would be in the area to meet and discuss “boundary demarcation and land tenure”. But Greg Ch’oc, spokesperson for the Maya Leaders’ Alliance, told us this evening that the villagers will not meet with Marin without their lawyer being present as the government is trying to use different tactics to avert the court ruling.
Greg Ch’oc, Spokesperson, Maya Leaders’ Alliance
“I believe that it clearly demonstrates the government’s intent on going about as if the decision has not been made, meaning that there’s no need to establish any process to implement the decision or to make the community recognize that they themselves can implement the decision of the court and doesn’t really have to establish any mechanism where the community can provide any input or the legal team that is representing the community can provide any input.”
Marion Ali
“Don’t you see their approach as being an effort to want to communicate?”
Greg Ch’oc
“Well the decision of the Supreme Court has far-reaching constitutional significance and I believe that that constitutional address must be done at the political level. So I expect the Prime Minister, I expect the Minister of Lands and I expect the government to establish a Ministerial or Committee that has the authority to put in place the formalisation or the legal framework to protect and demarcate the communal titling of those lands. I don’t expect any civil servant working at the community level to do that.”
On October eighteenth, Chief Justice Abdulai Conteh ruled that the villagers of Santa Cruz and Conejo in the Toledo District have constitutionally protected customary land tenure rights over the surrounding areas of their communities. According to Ch’oc, on November ninth, legal counsel for the Mayans wrote to Prime Minister Said Musa requesting that he “immediately direct the Lands Office to comply with the Supreme Court’s order by issuing a title document confirming the collective, customary title over the mapped area of Santa Cruz village.” The letter ends by advising the Minister to contact their attorney, Antoinette Moore, to schedule “any intended meetings with our village”
