Kim Simplis-Barrow is featured prominently in a recent publication of Harper Bazaar’s Interior Magazine, a spread which reportedly costs over a hundred thousand dollars. The fashion and lifestyle periodical has a subscription of primarily Middle Eastern readers and it is arguable that the audience is not comprised of visitors to Belize. The costly feature has […]
The Inspiration Center opened its doors to special needs children across Belize in March. While the modern facility has been celebrated as a premium care giving center, the women of the People’s United Party are asking for full financial disclosure, particularly for monies raised during various telethons and other fundraisers held abroad prior to the […]
Three Honduran men set out to sea last Tuesday heading to Placencia but they never got to their intended destination. Their vessel apparently experienced mechanical problems and the trio drifted for six days. The Coast Guard was put on alert and after midnight, the trio was spotted by a local fisherman in the area of […]
Minister of Health, Pablo Marin, might worry about pesky health-related matters like a lack of basic medication, no money to hire doctors and no money for properly equipped ambulances…but politician and area rep for Corozal Bay, Pablo Marin, doesn’t have those worries. His most pressing concern this weekend was probably how best to hand out […]
On Thursday, January thirtieth, forty-three-year-old Sittee River resident Ana Foster left home to go visit her son. She never reached his home. Early the next morning her lifeless body was found in an orange orchard in the village. She had been raped and murdered. One man was detained shortly after, though that information was never […]
After weeks of sustained fire by the Pharmacists’ Association of Belize, the Ministry of Health called a press conference this morning to allow C.E.O. Peter Allen to answer serious allegations being made against him. In essence, it appeared to be a show of unity for the embattled C.E.O., who has been of all sorts of […]
The decision to allow three other persons, including Danini Contreras, to approve Customs entries of pharmaceuticals was made on the strength of one email. That email was circulated on April eleventh by Procurement Manager, Arik Lima. It has been reported that in his email, Lima stated that Chief Pharmacist Sharon Anderson was on strike and […]
In October 2013, Administrator of the Southern Regional Hospital Nasley Sommerville was placed on suspension for suspected embezzlement of funds. A subsequent audit revealed that almost three hundred and seventy thousand dollars was siphoned off from the hospital’s Maternal and Child Health account over two years. Sommerville is to appear before the Public Services Commission. […]
That seems like woes aplenty, but there’s even more. News Five has been able to confirm that member of the K.H.M.H. Board of Directors, Maude Sylvester, resigned on Thursday. She is the second K.H.M.H. Board member to resign recently. We are told that the resignations are directly connected to the K.H.M.H.’s Director of Finance, Carlos […]
So where does Minister Pablo Marin stand in all this? C.E.O. Peter Allen is his hands on guy, his right hand, so to speak. Well, despite the myriad administrative and technical problems in the ministry, and despite the damning condemnation in the Auditor-General – Marin has his C.E.O.’s back. Reporter “Do you still maintain […]
On Wednesday Church leaders met with Prime Minister Dean Barrow to discuss the gender policy and other related issues. Some fringes of the organized church gave the impression that it would have been a heated, confrontational session – a kind of withdraw the gender policy or else scenario. But it wasn’t. By all indication it […]
With seeming accord between government and the churches, you might be a little confused by those militaristic releases condoning shutdown of schools and strikes or giving the government thirty days to withdraw the gender policy. Well, those releases are coming from a group called Belize Can Patriots, an alliance movement led by Patrick Menzies. According […]
On Thursday, the Caribbean Court of Justice ruled favorably on behalf of LGBT activist Maurice Tomlinson, granting him special leave to challenge the immigration acts of Belize and Trinidad & Tobago. The decision followed a suit which was filed in July of last year in which Tomlinson claims that the existing laws are prejudicial towards […]
Firebrand grassroots activist and president of BGYEA, Nigel Petillo, is again up in arms with the Lands Department over the Harmonyville community near mile forty-one on the George Price Highway. Petillo says that the process of developing the area is continuously frustrated by government which has made it clear that it was BGYEA’s responsibility. But […]
A training workshop on employers’ and workers’ rights and responsibilities under the Belize Labor Legislations and ILO conventions was held today in Belmopan. Representatives from the National Trade Union Congress of Belize and the Ministry of Labor and Local Government, including Labor Commissioner Ivan Williams, were on hand for the daylong session. Among the issues […]
Senator Hulse also spoke on the establishment of a Labor Advisory Commission which is chartered to look closely at issues pertaining to employment practices. Godwin Hulse, Minister of Local Government “Also worthy of mention is the appointment of the Labor Advisory Board. The main function of this body is to undertake a comprehensive review […]
SPISE, the Caribbean Science Foundation’s Student Program for Innovation in Science and Engineering is a prestigious program offered at the Cave Hill Campus of the University of the West Indies in Barbados. The program provides twenty students from across the Caribbean with the unique opportunity to a month of intense training in science and engineering […]
The latest stats on regional internet speeds versus cost are in, and Belize is coming in almost dead last, comparatively speaking. The report was submitted by the ICT Pulse, which has been tracking internet speeds and prices across the Caribbean since 2011. This year, they analyzed nineteen countries from the region. Of note is that […]
The Belize Electricity Workers Union and Belize Electricity Limited are at odds tonight over the fate of four long-standing employees. Come May seventeenth, a team of plant operators, stationed at the company’s mile-eight facility, will be unemployed following a decision to make their respective jobs redundant. In 2012, the government-owned utility transitioned from operating its […]
In responding to the concerns of the union, B.E.L.’s Manager of Corporate Services, Dawn Sampson-Nunez says that the employees were given a chance to undergo training but when they refused the offer that window of opportunity later expired. Dawn Sampson-Nunez, Manager, Corporate Services, B.E.L. “The company immediately offered to the employees involved the opportunity […]
There is one more report on Belize Electricity Limited. The company has announced an offering of twenty-five million dollars in series six debentures to shareholders in the government-owned company. While the bonds are being advertised to series three holders since May fifth, B.E.L. says it has been generating the interest of investors who are willing […]
Tourism stakeholders are meeting for the rest of this week in their expo known as BETEX. It is one of the major events hosted by the Belize Tourism Industry Association and this year, there are new and familiar faces. BETEX provides immense opportunities to those in the market to show what individual operators have to […]
There is other good news in the industry. The Belize Tourism Board is reporting that arrivals for overnight, cruise and airport visitors went up between January to March 2014, when compared to the same period last year. In respect of airport tourist arrivals, there was a ten percent increase for visitors arriving at the P.G.I.A., […]
News Five can confirm tonight that seventeen U.D.P. representatives have received fifty thousand Belize dollars each for Mother’s Day programs and activities in their respective constituencies. That’s a whopping eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars of government funds that have gone to the representatives on the government side of the House. At Christmas time, U.D.P. […]
Can you say cover-up at the highest levels of government? Well that’s just how it’s looking tonight. Last year, the Auditor-General was brought in to investigate corruption in the Ministry of Immigration. But there is confirmation that the Auditor-General finished her preliminary report in March and that copies of that report were handed over to […]
