Penner to remain seated on the U.D.P.’s backbench
Dean Barrow
When news broke that a South Korean national imprisoned in Taiwan, had received Belizean citizenship and passport, the Prime Minister put Elvin Penner out of cabinet and announced that he was asking the former minister of state to also resign from the party and as area representative. That has not happened and Penner says he has overwhelming support in Cayo Northeast. The opposition set things in motion and now has the required signatures to trigger a recall. But does the P.M. really want Penner to resign given the slim majority in the House? Despite his noticeable absence from the previous two sittings of the House of Representatives, Penner’s seat remains intact. He is still a duly elected representative who sits on the backbench of the ruling party receiving a handsome salary and perks. Flashback to 2011, former Orange Walk East area representative Marcel Cardona’s resignation was accepted even though he did not in effect resign from the U.D.P. Cardona was relegated to a corner seat on the other side of the floor. When asked if Penner will also be subjected to similar treatment, the P.M. says that after discussing the matter with other senior officials, Penner will remain on the U.D.P.’s backbench.
Prime Minister Dean Barrow
“We thought that after a discussion in cabinet that that was more appropriate than to put him on the other side would not be fair to the facts. Cardona, in his circumstances, had all but joined the P.U.P. by the time we felt that we needed to formally get rid of him as part of our caucus. That’s not the case with Penner. We need to make clear that there is now the physical literal distance, as well as the political distance between us but we didn’t think that it would be appropriate to put him on the P.U.P. side of the house.”
So where has the self righteous indignation gone? From being kicked out of cabinet, from being threatened with expulsion from the UDP if he didn’t resign. Penner has gone from persona non grata to welcome home to the UDP. We bex but we no dat bex with Penner anymore. Interesting what a couple more scandals do to change people’s mind.
YOU SHOULD BE PUTTING HIM IN JAIL!!
the very Honorable Penner is a solid elected UDP corruption officer.
there is no reason he should be in the dog house with the puppies.
GO Penner!!!!! Cayo and Belize need more remorseless godless men like you.
It’s the first time we see a Prime Minister trying to protect criminals, just because he want to stay in power. Greed knows no end with these disgraceful mother effers! His instruction must have been, no investigation of the million dollars thief Penner, shred, deploy staff, and to hell with the goodie, goodie Belizean people. When poor people are in jail for a stick of weed, or for stealing a tin of milk, or a some food to eat, we see million dollars criminals driving around in SUV’s that our money bought, and being called honorable. That sucks! When all else fails, its time for a revolution!
If the good must die so that honesty prevail, so be it!
Unu lef penner alone. He da no di only incompetent tiefin udp so why he haftu di get all di credit? But you haftu laugh causr if da neva fi di simple pm nobody mi weh know notin bout penner cause no nisbet no taiwanese ambassada no mi weh run go tell nobody else. But you see di pm spiteful and it come right back come nite ah. Castro shoudda di hold penner hand da back de too and i could just imagine di rest a dem deserve some dishonorable mention too but by now di booboo pm done learn fi shet ih mouth.
The PM said, that’s not the case with Penner, we tried to kicked him out when we said that he can no longer ever be a member of our party, but Castro has done bad too so we need to hug and make up. We need to make clear that there is now the physical literal distance, which we don’t want to widen, as well as the political distance between us, because we could very easily topple over and we don’t want that. We didn’t think about what we were doing long enough. We felt it would not be appropriate to put him on the other side of the house, because we don’t want to end our hustling. To be fair to the facts, given the circumstances we needed to flip flap in our approach, and we will keep doing that as long as it keep us in power. Yes, its a fair statement to say that we keep changing what we say, so as confuse the people, but it is working and we feel good about that.