Prime Minister Dean Barrow said today that his Foreign Minister is safe at home and that he did not intend to remove Wilfred Elrington from Cabinet for his use of the word artificial in describing the established borders between Belize and Guatemala. But the Prime Minister conceded that Elrington should have perhaps apologized for his […]
Still on the issue of the border dispute, Senator and former Foreign Minister, Eamon Courtenay, on Tuesday outlined a best case scenario of seven years before the Belize/Guatemala dispute would see the light of day at the International Court of Justice. That timeframe was based on upcoming election cycles in both Belize and Guatemala, which […]
Another hot button issue which has provoked the ire of the public was the decision to grant visa waivers to Israeli nationals. Israel is known is to be a top supplier of arms to Guatemala which is claiming as much as fifty percent of Belizean territory so that move set off a flurry of condemnation. […]
The courts were chockfull of cases today. We start with the case of Speednet against Telemedia. Attorneys Andrew Marshalleck and Eamon Courtenay, on behalf of Smart, filed for and received an interim injunction on Monday that restrained Telemedia from taking any further actions that would damage its services to its customers. That injunction held in […]
Another hearing before the Supreme Court is one of the cases of Mayor Zenaida Moya Flowers, in which she is challenging the constitutionality of the meeting of the National Party Council of the United Democratic Party on October third, which expelled her. This was after she was criminally charged with twenty-two counts of Uttering a […]
But while today’s case was on the legality of the meeting of the National Party Council (N.P.C.), her statement came under direct focus. One of Moya’s attorneys, Elson Kaseke, argued that the statement was not directed at the prime minister. Kaseke explained what he meant later to reporters, after which his counterpart, Michael Young, offered […]
Also in the Supreme Court today, Judge Oswald Legall determined that the Trustees of the B.T.L. Employees Trust had no standing or right to bring the constitutional challenge to the recent nationalization of Sunshine Holdings Limited and its shares in B.T.L. News Five caught up with Dean Boyce, one of the trustees, who said that […]
On Wednesday News Five broke the story that another Jamaican company is seeking the green light from government for large scale deep sea fishing in the south. Rainforest Limited, which is affiliated to Aquamar Limited, a local seafood export company, is proposing to build a multimillion dollar facility in southern Belize that would process at […]
There is also controversy over the PG Fishing Company, which has a joint venture with the Rio Grande Cooperative of Punta Gorda. Also of Jamaican origin, its boats arrived over the weekend intending to conduct fishing operations in southern Belize. The Fisheries and Environment Departments say that PG Fishing does not yet have a license […]
This week has been a deadly one so far. There have been three murders and the latest two were recorded this morning when shots rang out in separate incidents, but in the same hood. The shootings happened just two blocks away and within one hour of each other and shortly after the two victims were […]
This morning’s second murder was around seven-twenty at the corner of Kraal and Faber’s Road. The victim was shot several times at close range by someone on a bicycle. The shooter was so brazen to carry out his act that armed Belize Defense Force and uniformed police officers patrolling nearby did not deter him. Reports […]
Meanwhile, a man who was shot on Monday evening remains in critical condition at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital. Dwane Lopez of Supal Street was shot in the back at around six-twenty-five on Monday evening on the same street. But police do not believe that Lopez was the intended victim. Instead, they strongly suspect the […]
Over the weekend the vessels of a Jamaican fishing company came ashore in Punta Gorda. It bore the name PG Fishing Company Limited which was born out of an agreement with the Rio Grande Cooperative, a local fishermen cooperative. This irked the local fishing community and officially the word was that no license would be […]
Turning to the hot button issue of the forty-five million dollar loan, last Friday, Prime Minister Dean Barrow and the Minister of Public Utilities signed off a statutory instrument nationalizing the debt, held by Telemedia with the British Caribbean Bank since 2007. The Telemedia Chairman, Net Vasquez, on November thirtieth, declared the debt illegal. The […]
We also asked the Prime Minister about the cash strapped City Council which has been unable to pay for the city’s garbage collection. Suggestions on how to curb expenses and increase revenue collection abound and no other than the P.M. himself had a few. Councilors from the old capital earn more than councilors in other […]
The dust appeared to have settled of late on the August nationalization of Telemedia, but the issue has surfaced head on again because of an outstanding debt of forty-five million dollars for which the British Caribbean Bank is demanding payment. Senator Godwin Hulse says that for government to acquire this loan, which would have to […]
On Tuesday, Smart announced that it had fully restored its international and roaming services, through another source, and not through Telemedia which last Friday pulled the plug on the company stranding ninety thousand subscribers. Word to News Five is that the situation got physical this afternoon when Smart made adjustments to its external equipment, which […]
Guatemalan national, twenty-two year old Glenda Montero of Succotz Village was on trial for the murder of her husband Cornelio; a crime police say she admitted to committing. But tonight Glenda is free because the caution statement with her confession, which the case depended upon, was not allowed into evidence and police had no other […]
Another issue that has now been settled is the squabble between Ministers Michael Finnegan and Carlos Perdomo. That was over a parcel of land being purchased by one of Finnegan’s Constituents, Dawn Jorguenson, and which was being taken away by Perdomo back in October. But after a public tongue lashing from Finnegan, he and the […]
Both the Corozal and Orange Walk teachers unions have publicly come out against the proposed amendments to the Education Act, primarily because of the terms of the Teaching Services Commission. The Minister of Education, Patrick Faber, has said he is moving ahead and the amendment will be tabled in the House on December eleventh. Since […]
It’s the season for giving and six organizations are benefiting from a large supply of medical and educational material. The donation was made today by the U.S. armed forces to the Belize Defense Force for onward distribution to the Non Governmental Organizations. A representative from the U.S. Embassy was on hand to make the delivery. […]
There is one more allegation to add to a long and growing list of charges of negligence in the national health system. This latest claim comes from a popular local performer who finds himself recuperating at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital after his transfer from the Southern Regional Hospital. Twenty-seven year old Albert Tillett Junior, […]
In August the government nationalized Belize Telemedia Limited and since then it has made public statements against its competitor, Smart. The two have embarked on aggressive marketing campaigns, but Telemedia has gone one step further and is literally pulling the plug on Smart and it looks like the days of the monopoly are not too […]
The Flores Bus Line that runs the Ladyville/Lords Bank route already has a legal matter with the Transport Department before the courts. The injunction came after the Department suspended Flores Bus Line from operating for a month, during which his permit would have expired. So Flores, through Attorney Hubert Elrington, sought the court’s intercession on […]
But this afternoon, Minister of Transport, Melvin Hulse, said the problem lies with the same ring of bus owners who keep breaking the regulations and the schedules. Melvin Hulse, Minister of Transport “Anytime yoh hear people noh get something yoh hear all kinda mada rugu bout it. We need to go beyond dis. People need […]
