A referendum on whether or not to take the territorial dispute to the International Court of Justice takes place in 2013. In Guatemala, a public awareness campaign is ongoing but in Belize the campaign will kick off in January. Government is taking a three prong approach; it is naming a commission comprising a number of […]
After resisting the courts for years, in 2007, Guatemala, under the leadership of President Alvaro Cocom, finally agreed to start negotiating a special agreement to go to the ICJ. That agreement, known as a compromis, contains the question that will be asked in the simultaneous referenda as well as the question being taken to the […]
The City Centre in Belize City has not been used for over a year because its dilapidating state would put athletes at risk. When Belize won silver in the COCABA Basketball games in 2009 in Cancun, the Prime Minister promised the athletes that rebuilding the facility would be a priority. The Mexican President Felipe Calderon […]
Tonight, John McAfee, the US anti-virus founder, is still on the run wanted for questioning in the murder of his neighbor, Gregory Faull, who was found dead at his San Pedro home on Sunday. His elderly father, Hart Faull, arrived in Belize today from Florida to take back his body. McAfee has been in constant […]
McAfee, his first brush with the law gained him notoriety in Belize. Back in May 2012, his house in Carmelita was searched by the Gang Suppression Unit. McAfee claimed he was held for long hours and it took the intervention of the US Embassy to get him released. In an interview he gave to News […]
Approximately forty employees were fired from Belize Waste Control Limited on Monday; twenty of them protested at City Hall since their termination was the result of an unpaid debt of over six hundred thousand dollars. BWC General Manager, George Lamb, says they needed to get the mayor’s attention and a second protest was planned for […]
The mending of fences between the City Hall and Waste Control is also being helped by government intervention. Prime Minister Dean Barrow was asked to give his take on the huge arrears, especially at a time when the council is trying to float a twenty million dollar bond for infrastructure works. The PM says Mayor […]
The government and Maya communities have been at odds over oil drilling and exploration in communal lands in southern Belize. In June 2010 Chief Justice Abdulai Conteh declared that thirty-three Maya communities had customary land tenure in their villages. That should have settled the perennial problem, but despite the court declaration, not much has changed […]
Hearings by the Public Accounts Committee and whether they should be held public have been hotly debated for days. Its present Chair, Area Representative for Cayo South, Julius Espat, says they should; but due to wrangling among committee members, Tuesday’s hearings were held behind closed doors and then quickly adjourned. Espat maintains that the U.D.P. […]
The Prime Minister also touched on his party’s internal politics. Minister of Education Patrick Faber will reportedly be mounting a challenge against the Deputy Prime Minister, Gaspar Vega. Faber wants to unseat Vega as deputy party leader. Under Vega’s watch, the U.D.P. stronghold in the north was severely diminished in the last general elections. Prime […]
A post mortem examination on the body of Gregory Faull was conducted today at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital. The results have not been released, but three persons have been detained and the search continues for John McAfee. McAfee is wanted for questioning about the murder of his neighbor, Gregory Faull, who was shot once […]
US television networks such as ABC, CNBC and CBS have been following the story on McAfee who was worth at least a hundred million US dollars when he sold his antivirus company in the US. McAfee has told Joshua Davis of Wired.com that he did not kill Faull and that in fact, he believes he […]
At the top of the newscast, we reported that John McAfee was still on the lam and that he is wanted for questioning in the weekend murder of Gregory Faull. The last interview McAfee gave locally was to this station; since then he has only been speaking to the international media. One of his favorite […]
What should have been a productive meeting among members of the Public Accounts Committee to strategize a way forward, turned out to be a clerical disaster on Monday. The meeting was highly anticipated in light of an unfavorable report by Auditor General Dorothy Bradley, which highlights the fleecing of government’s finances. But before the meeting […]
According to Espat, a personal review of an audio recording of the committee’s inaugural meeting will be done on Wednesday, after which another meeting will be scheduled for December third. Espat further stated that he sought advice from government’s legal advisor, Gian Ghandi, on the matter of public attendance at the committee meeting. Ghandi, he […]
A second round of protest against City Hall is planned for this Wednesday by employees of Belize Waste Control Limited. The protest began on Monday by twenty employees of forty who had been laid off because City Hall was in arrears of more than ten weeks to the BWC. General Manager of BWC, George Lamb, […]
Belize Waste Control has a long standing garbage collection contract with CitCo; twenty years to be exact. But the problems with the timely payments to the company only started in 2008. Despite not being paid, Lamb says that BWC will honor its contract to collect garbage. Lamb says that there is a breakdown in communication […]
The following story is about a father of two who needs your help. Twenty-one year old Kevin Martinez has been recovering for months after suffering severe burns to his body. He endangered his own life to save his family and his belongings from a fire that started on a piece of furniture. While he is […]
A Corozal man was critically injured in a case of alleged police brutality and tonight Samir Viva remains hospitalized at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital. According to his girlfriend, Stephanie Sanker, he has been the victim of constant harassment by police without good reason. She says that on numerous occasions, Vivas has been picked up, […]
Twenty years ago, our own William Neal won an award from CNN for a story on Anastacio Soler, a chiclero who was born in Benque Viejo and spent his adult life extracting chicle from sapodilla trees throughout Belize as well as in Guatemala and Mexico. Soler, one of the last remaining chiclero’s, passed away on […]
On Friday, the Baptist Association released information on Julio Cesar Garcia who had been posing as a pastor in Frank’s Eddy Village and has been charged with the carnal knowledge of an eleven year old school girl. The Association says that Garcia is not the pastor of Frank’s Eddy; neither is he a registered pastor […]
In Belmopan, the Public Accounts Committee was convened this afternoon but the meeting ended with a whimper. There was a huge hullabaloo prior to today’s meeting because of recent reports presented by the Auditor General, which show gross irregularities in government expenditure for 2010-2011. The chairman of the committee is Julius Espat, the area representative […]
The Belize City Council is reportedly under dire financial straits. A twenty-million dollar bond for the improvement of city streets is yet to be launched. Still yet, works have been ongoing on various streets which have been stressing out the City’s finances so much so that it is acutely in the red. Earlier today, employees […]
Two of the women who claim to have been victims of medical malpractice at the Northern Regional Hospital have started the process of taking legal action. Magdalena Chable and Sally Coh who are both from Orange Walk told News Five today that they met with a lawyer and are initiating a multi-million dollar lawsuit after […]
A formal inspection of a fleet of nine buses, belonging to Godwin Haylock Senior, concluded this morning at the Novelos Bus Terminal, following a brief suspension in the wake of a near-fatal traffic mishap on October thirty-first. The incident, which almost claimed the life of nine year-old Martin Noble, a primary school student, who was […]
