U.D.P. elects slate for City Council Elections

Dion Leslie

The 2012 Municipal elections are about seven months away and the political parties are about to put their campaign into full throttle. The first rumblings of political fervor were felt at the IT-VET compound where the United Democratic Party held its City Council convention.  Three of the current city councilors did not contest the elections and one incumbent lost his bid for reelection. News Five spoke to City Councilor Dion Leslie who said that over three thousand six hundred city residents took part in the selection process.

Dion Leslie, City Councilor

“We had a good turnout; it wasn’t as big as the previous municipal convention that was held in ’08—of course everyone knows that convention had thirty-four candidates vying for councilors and a very heated mayoral contest between Anthony Michaels and the current mayor, Zenaida Moya. So that brought out, I think that fueled the energy and we had over six thousand voters that time. Yesterday we had over three thousand six hundred voters, which is still a great turnout. As for a mayor, Mister Darrell Bradley was endorsed as the mayoral candidate. We had sixteen people who went up for the ten posts of councilors. Only ten could have made it, but you had six of the incumbent returning to office along with four new faces; that being: Alifa Elrington, Bernard Q. Pitts Jr., Doctor Alain Gonzalez and Mister Michael Theus along with myself, Councilor Singh, Deputy Mayor Samuels, Councilor Willoughby, Councilor Espejo and Councilor Chang. So that is the ten that will be making up the team for the U.D.P. municipal elections next year. We had only Councilor Usher who contested the convention, unfortunately he didn’t make it. As for the other incumbent councilors, they have decided to move on to greener pasture; as you can say. But in reality only seven of us current councilors put our name in for the ten spots.  We tell people yes we do understand us that there are some shortcomings when it comes to the council with finance and when it comes to streets and drains and when we break it down to people, they understand us they say we’ll give you a chance. But as I’ve always said, please don’t limit the Belize City Council to only streets and drains. Yes we understand that is our number one priority and mandate, but the council also has a social responsibility to the residents of Belize City and I believe this council has done far more than any council previous to this. We’ve implemented so many new projects, so many new back to school programs, concerts—just basic social programs to uplift the entire city, to uplift the residents and those visiting the city. We have plans going in—we haven’t sat down as a group as yet—but we do have plans with the new people coming in. We’re looking at brand new ways to increase revenues for the council without pressuring city residents. So the next three years, we hope to implement these things and right all the wrongs that people have this misconception of the council.”

Attorney Darrell Bradley will lead the slate as he went uncontested in his bid for U.D.P. Mayoral candidate.