Red and blue square off over billboard
As elections draw near political tensions are expected to rise. So today’s confrontation over a party billboard, while not to be condoned, was not exactly a surprise. This afternoon police were called out as party activists from both sides clashed over the erection of a large sign on public land at the corner of Freetown Road and Saint Thomas Street. News Five was there to get all the angles: the red, the blue, and the police.
Henry Usher, Secretary General, P.U.P.
“Well we were informed that the U.D.P. City Council was taking down our sign; this was around two-thirty this afternoon. When we got out here, the sign was already half way down, so we told them that they had no legal footing to take down our sign. The police was called in and they informed them of the same thing and the city council left and then they came back with all their brute force to take down the sign again.”
Marion Ali
“Whose property is this?”
Henry Usher
“The sign?”
Marion Ali
“The property on which the sign is on?”
Henry Usher
“The government property, government property.”
Marion Ali
“So that means it falls under the government and not the city council? The mayor was claiming this is city council property.”
Henry Usher
“At the end of the day we’ve always have convention in elections that both—in fact all political parties are allowed to put up whatever sign they want, wherever they want. The procedure they are talking about is not in the law. In fact there is a precedent when Paul Rodriguez was mayor, he took down a sign and they took him to court and he lost in court. So they can’t take down our sign, they have no legal footing to take down our sign and we will stand by that.”
Marion Ali
“And you don’t see it as an infringement on the City Council’s right? If it’s on their property that you gonna put up a P.U.P. sign on a U.D.P. council, well a council’s property?”
Henry Usher
“I don’t see it as an infringement of the right. At the end of the day we have freedom of association, freedom of speech, and we can put up a sign that say anything that we want. I don’t see it as an infringement of anything. The council has no legal footing to stand on.”
Marion Ali
“Tell us about the act that the Mayor was referring to?”
Henry Usher
“Well I can only assume she’s referring to the City Council act, but I don’t know what she’s referring to in the act. Both parties, in fact all political parties agreed to not touch each others sign. This is a clear breaking of that agreement. This was an agreement done with the police commissioner, all the heads of department of the police department.”
Marion Ali
“When was this done?”
Henry Usher
“About two weeks ago in Belmopan.”
Marion Ali
“What about each others property, which means land, the public property?”
Henry Usher
“It means you can put up your sign where you want to put up your sign. When the P.U.P. was the City Council, we allowed the U.D.P. to put up signs wherever they wanted to. They had signs all over the place, now B.E.L. has said that they don’t want signs on their lamppost so we have to find another way to put up the signs and this is one of the other ways.”
Zenaida Moya, Mayor, Belize City
“What this Act says, Belize City Council Act; it’s on page twenty-eight, section twenty-six, sub-section one. Any person who not been authorised by the council or by any law, encroaches on a street by making or erecting any building, fence, ditch or other obstacle or work of any kind upon, over or under it or planting any tree or shrub therein is guilty of an offence and is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding five hundred dollars and to a further sum equal to the cost incurred by the council in removing the encroachment, obstruction or matter or in repairing any injury done as specified in paragraph about, alright. This da the law. They have also had the police officers out here obstructing our City Council workers from doing their jobs and the City Council Act specifically states that anybody who obstructs City Council workers from doing his or her job commits an offence and is liable upon summary conviction.”
Marion Ali
“Was there not an agreement sign between both parties for mutual use of public grounds?”
Zenaida Moya
“No, there was no, no request. I have the councillor responsible for that and he has already indicated that there has been no request, okay. None.”
Marion Ali
“Because Mr. Usher is telling me there was an agreement made about two weeks ago.”
Zenaida Moya
“Let him show me it in writing. If he had gotten permission and telling you, him being a lawyer and all would have already ensure that he would have produced that to us, don’t you think so?”
Sr. Superintendent Chester Williams, Deputy Cmdr., Eastern Division
“I personally came out and I met with Mark King who told me that the P.U.P. has erected a sign and have owed for the spot where the sign is and that they will have the sign removed. I have subsequently told him that two wrong doesn’t make a right and if the P.U.P. owe for the spot where the sign is then the proper thing to do is to take the matter to court and let the court issue an order to have the sign removed legally. It is just as if someone is trying to [unintelligible] you don’t go and just arbitrarily move that person off the land; there are procedures that need to be followed. If a person commits a breach of the law then the law takes its course, you do not take action by doing another wrong because then you just compound the problem then.”
We left police at the scene making sure that things stayed peaceful. Mayor Moya vows that the sign will be taken down.
