The popular image of a Belizean customs officer is that of a stern faced man or woman who pours through your suitcases at the airport or makes you file reams of paperwork to clear a shipment at the Belize City port. But those images are not the whole picture, as News Five’s Kendra Griffith discovered […]
The ongoing drama between the Belize City Council, the Belize Tourism Board and Government seems to have hit an impasse. On Friday, the council fired off a steamy press lambasting the Musa administration for what it says was an “act of utter bad faith.” According to Mayor Zenaida Moya, the board’s decision to give the […]
Traffic was back to normal on the Northern Highway this morning after three days of delays caused by a collapsed river embankment. According to the Ministry of Works, crews completed the repairs between mile six and seven on Saturday evening, installing reinforced sheet piles to strengthen the road. Engineers have noted that other sections of […]
As was evident earlier in this newscast, Godfrey Smith has a lot on his plate regarding the ongoing negotiations with the Belize City Council, but this afternoon to the Tourism Minister told us he’s not going to let the issue of the Head Tax cloud the celebration of Tourism Awareness Week. Godfrey Smith “I think […]
For months, the Belizean citrus industry has been walking a minefield of controversy and this weekend proved to be one more misstep. Saturday’s special general meeting featured yet another contentious face off between management and growers regarding the conclusion of the share sale between Citrus Products of Belize Limited and Eastern Caribbean investors, Banks Holdings. […]
Today’s oil spill in Orange Walk has reignited safety and health concerns posed by the growing petroleum industry. This morning Minister Johnny Briceño readdressed questions surrounding the lack of an Environmental Impact Assessment for the operations of Belize Natural Energy. According to Briceño, the omission was an oversight but stressed that the company is weeks […]
While the distribution of the proceeds from the Head Tax on cruise passengers is the subject of a boiling political controversy, the locomotive for Belize’s tourism train continues to remain traditional overnight vacationers. And the latest statistics from the Belize Tourism Board show that while current growth rates do not match those of the last […]
The good news for minimum wage workers announced last week was confirmed today as officials explained details of the immediate twenty-five percent increase plus future hikes. In May 2006, a nine member council made up of workers, employers and independent partners was commissioned to review and if necessary revise the minimum wage. After seven months […]
While former mayor Jose Coye discussed the City Council’s finances, Health Minister Jose Coye had more current wounds to heal … like government’s proposed takeover of Universal Health Services. According to Coye, the government is now in the process of settling debts and negotiating with the existing shareholders. Jose Coye, Minister of Health
The Ministry of Natural Resources has released its year end report on petroleum and despite a recent decline in world oil prices, the treasury is beginning to feel some impact from the four producing wells at Spanish Lookout. The figures show a total of over eight hundred eleven thousand barrels of light sweet crude pumped […]
Last Wednesday, the Belize City Council made public its intention to lobby the Musa administration for one U.S. dollar of the seven dollar head tax collected from arriving cruise ship passengers. Since then the council has launched a city wide advertising campaign to publicise the issue and according to Mayor Zenaida Moya, are soliciting the […]
The citrus controversy is heating up again in the south as a published notice to growers is calling for yet another special general meeting. According to the advertisement, the meeting has been called for January twentieth at the Citrus Growers Association’s compound at mile nine on the Stann Creek Valley Road. Items on the agenda […]
As a source of Thursday news, Godfrey Smith’s column in the Belize Times is getting to be as reliable as a Rolex. In today’s issue, the Minister of Tourism for the first time publicly reveals what appears to be a crisis in the cruise industry. His take is that Luke Espat and Carnival have reached […]
With the financially strapped Nova shrimp farm recently place under receivership, it is conceivable that over one half of the nation’s traditional shrimp production may be lost to the market. That would be a blow to an industry that was, as recently as just a few years ago, poised to become Belize’s number one foreign […]
And in another piece of economic news, Cabinet has approved the recommendation of the Wages Council for a hike in the nation’s minimum wage. The increase, to be phased in over three years, will raise the minimum wage to three dollars per hour for all workers by 2010. Currently the minimum rate for domestic workers […]
One of Belize’s largest shrimp farms is in financial trouble and its lenders are looking for ways to put it back in shape. In 1998 the Nova Farm, located in Ladyville, borrowed nine point five million U.S. dollars from the International Finance Corporation, which is the private lending arm of the World Bank, and the […]
The fallout following the announcement that a major investment in Belize’s citrus industry by Eastern Caribbean interests has been consummated, continued today as architects of the deal defended their decision to complete the purchase, even though several conditions mandated by the membership of the Citrus Growers Association had not been met. News Five’s Janelle Chanona […]
There is no present, no future; only the past repeating itself again and again. I’m not sure who said that but the quote certainly applies to Belize’s citrus industry. Just as a compromise seemed to have been brokered between opposing factions of the Citrus Growers Association, events have transpired to once again sow distrust and […]
It is a common practice for vessels that engage in illegal fishing to be punished by the nation whose flag they happen to fly. But last week, instead of a rogue fisherman being sanctioned it was a ship suspected of engaging in radical environmental action that lost its papers. According to a release from IMMARBE, […]
And while we should have a new top prosecutor by mid-week, the dust has yet to settle on the unusual exit of the old one. Today Assistant Commissioner of Income Tax Marilyn Ordonnez emphasised that the stopping of former D.P.P. Kirk Anderson at the airport for non-payment of income tax was done at the behest […]
In news from the citrus industry, a press release today has announced that the sale of almost half the company is a done deal. According to the Citrus Growers Association, following two separate decisions in the Supreme Court, on Friday December twenty-second, forty-six point five nine percent of the shares of Citrus Products of Belize […]
In these final weeks before Christmas there have been literally dozens of special raffles, large and small. But none has generated more buzz than the one conducted by General Sales Tax Department. News Five’s Janelle Chanona was on hand for today’s grand prize draw. Janelle Chanona, Reporting As part of a month long awareness campaign […]
Since it opened in June 2005, Ready Call Centre has had its share of publicity, and not all of it has been good. But today, the company was in high spirits as it celebrated its relocation to a new headquarters. Ready Call left the cramped confines of its New Road location in November and transferred […]
Two southside Belize City primary schools will receive funding of close to a million dollars for badly needed new classrooms. According to the Ministry of National Development, financing for the construction at St. John Vianney R.C. and St. Luke Methodist was approved at a meeting held on Friday by the Social Investment Fund’s board of […]
During a brief contract signature ceremony this morning, the Government of Belize officially wrapped up more than a year of negotiations with the Inter-American Development Bank to secure twenty-five million U.S. dollars of what has become a steady stream of concessionary financing for Belmopan. The twenty year loan carries an interest rate of five point […]
