As we said on Friday, U.D.P. aspirants for national elections have submitted their names to the secretariat. Among those who have interest in running in the national elections is councilor, Dean Samuels. It’s a crowded field in Belize Rural Central where Samuels will have to beat at least five others including Beverly Castillo, former C.E.O. […]
Minister of State turned political and public pariah Elvin Penner has gone M.I.A. Penner was castigated for his role in procuring nationality status and a Belizean passport for South Korean, Wonhong Kim. But while being declared persona non grata seems to be the extent of Penner’s reprimand, there remains a public perception that he should […]
The debate on the thirteenth senator has been resurrected in recent weeks. It’s a concept which was passed into law by the U.D.P., but it never materialized. While the two matters are separate, the need for a thirteenth senator owes its resurrection to the ongoing immigration scandal. Recently, the Senate was deadlocked on a vote […]
The deadline for submission of names for persons wanting to offer themselves for candidacy in upcoming conventions to be held by the United Democratic Party is today. While a list of prospective runners has not been divulged to the media, News Five understands that there are at least three new faces that have come forward […]
On October fifth the People’s United Party launched a campaign to collect signatures on a petition to recall Elvin Penner. The move came just weeks after news broke of the U.D.P. Cayo Northeast Representative’s involvement in a passport scandal in which a South Korean criminal got a passport while imprisoned in Taiwan. The P.U.P. move […]
At a press conference on Wednesday, Prime Minister Dean Barrow scoffed at the evidence proving that Minister of State Edmond Castro is engaged in the large-scale procuring of visas for Chinese nationals. News Five first showed you the documents on Tuesday – documents which prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that Edmond Castro and […]
On Wednesday, Prime Minister Dean Barrow spoke on a variety of issues at a press conference in Belize City, and today P.U.P. leader, Francis Fonseca, did the same. Fonseca touched on infrastructure, immigration and everything in between. While the issues are the same, it’s no great surprise that the interpretations and positions are markedly different. […]
Minister of Immigration, Godwin Hulse, has proposed three new pieces of legislation which, if passed into law, will have the Immigration Department running like, in his words, a well-oiled machine. But today, Fonseca dismissed them as all glitter and no substance, calling them band-aid measures to give the impression that much is being done, when […]
Back to the press conference hosted by the Opposition. Prime Minister Barrow on Wednesday went on record to give government’s full support to the stance of the cañeros that they should receive payment for bagasse. P.U.P. leader, Francis Fonseca, today stated his government’s position, and it is the same. But that’s where any accord ends, […]
Today Prime Minister Dean Barrow held a press conference to discuss what he termed a catastrophe visited by the incessant rains. We’ll have those comments later in our newscast, but first we touch on an issue which after weeks on boil, seems to have gone to a slow simmer. In recent weeks no official information […]
Tonight there is much more to bring you on the visa quota hustle. On Tuesday News Five had an exclusive look at documents which prove that Minister of State Edmund Castro was neck deep in the procurement of visas for Chinese nationals – sending in recommendations to the Director of Immigration almost weekly. But it […]
Councilor Eric Chang returned to Belize on Tuesday after an extended stay in Taiwan but his boss, Belize City Mayor Darrell Bradley, is yet to have a meeting with Chang to discuss the issue of his alleged involvement in the Penner passport scandal. Despite efforts to contact Chang while he was away, the Mayor was […]
The European Union is clustering Belize with Cambodia and Guinea as countries that have not done much to stamp our illegal fishing. On Tuesday, the EU announced a ban on fish imports from the three countries. The government that since it took over the registry it has moved quickly to rectify the deficiencies, including the […]
In its 2008 campaign manifesto, the United Democratic Party promised serious governance reform by introducing the idea of a thirteenth senator. That additional Senator would have come from the NGO community, and would have shifted the balance of power away from government. The immediate result would be a Senate with teeth, a powerful oversight body. […]
Tonight, there is telling information that U.D.P. Minister of State Edmond Castro is involved in the mass procuring of visas for Chinese nationals. One month ago Castro was accused by a whistleblower of accepting money to facilitate visas. He denied those allegations via press release saying there were only five recommendations made by him. But […]
Former Deputy Mayor, Eric Chang, who has been away in Taiwan on an extended leave of absence, returned to Belize today. The councilor departed for his home country along with Belize City Mayor Darrell Bradley in early September on an official visit. While away, Chang’s name was called in a passport scandal, involving erstwhile Minister […]
The P.U.P. will reportedly be handing over signatures to the governor general to trigger a referendum in the Cayo Northeast. According to information from a P.U.P. source, over two thousand signatures have been collected, which is above the number required to trigger the recall of former Minister of State, Elvin Penner. The P.U.P. is fielding […]
Belize’s former Minister of State Elvin Penner and current Minister of State Edmond Castro have made it onto the pages of one of the world’s leading news journals, the Economist. The Economist is a weekly magazine of news and opinions which is regarded as one of the most eminent of its kind. It provides coverage […]
Cordel Hyde, he is the former Lake Independence Area Rep under the P.U.P. Administration. Since then, Hyde has left the party and has been seen as a traitor to the P.U.P. But earlier this year, in August, there were rumors of the consideration of a possible return of Hyde to the People’s United Party; his […]
But for Luke Espat…his chances seem even slimmer than his political comrade. Several of Espat’s businesses have gone into receivership, including the Port of Belize Limited and Renaissance Towers. But is it his owing Belize Bank some twenty-nine million dollars that stands between him and standard bearer for Cayo Central? Francis Fonseca, P.U.P. Leader […]
Vision Inspired by the People, in light of a recent news article published by the foreign press in which Guatemalan fugitive Roberto Barreda, accused of killing his wife before absconding to Mexico with their two kids and was reportedly found in possession of fraudulent Belizean passports at the time of his arrest in Merida, is […]
When the government turned down the restructuring of the Public Accounts Committee, the Opposition walked out and the hearing continued by the committee made up only of Government ministers. Julius Espat, the P.U.P. Deputy Leader has been at the forefront of the charge to change the composition of the PAC. The social partners have […]
When we caught up earlier today with the P.U.P. Deputy Leader, Julius Espat, he told us that the recall effort of U.D.P. Cayo Northeast area representative Elvin Penner is one step closer to becoming a reality for voters in that constituency. The opposition, he says, has garnered more than the prescribed number of signatures necessary […]
The social partners are tonight expressing satisfaction that the majority of their recommendations were accepted to restructure the Public Accounts Committee, including a change to the working group. Those suggestions were presented by the Council of Churches, the unions, as well as the business sector during individual meetings with pro tem chairman John Saldivar. After […]
The Senate met on Wednesday in Belmopan to consider three bills, some housecleaning write-offs, but the hot button issue was a motion brought by Opposition Senator Lisa Shoman for the appointment of a Special Select Committee. In a nutshell, it was proposed that the Select Committee would investigate and inquire into any and all facets […]
