Prime Minister Said Musa took time off the campaign trail this afternoon to participate in the official ground breaking ceremony for a new radar and infrastructural upgrade to the National Meteorological Service. According to the Met Service, a state of the art Doppler Weather Radar will be installed in Ladyville by June and in operation […]
With its own healthy revenues from hotel taxes and little official oversight, the Belize Tourism Board is the envy of many less well endowed government institutions. Today the B.T.B. invited the public to see how it was spending some of that money. News Five’s Kendra Griffith reports. This afternoon the Belize Tourism Board officially inaugurated […]
Murder number three for 2008—and the second for Belize City—took place last night in a familiar place and involved a name not unknown to police. News Five’s Janelle Chanona has the story. Janelle Chanona, Reporting Around eight-thirty last night, twenty-one year old Carlton Tasher was riding his bicycle on Gill Street when a lone gunman […]
And while three homicides are still three too many, that rate is still well off last year’s record pace which, according to official figures, saw a total of ninety-seven people killed. Belize, however, was not the only Caribbean country that had a bad 2007. Jamaica, a nation with roughly ten times our population, recorded over […]
Three months after they changed their stories on the stand, the police officers involved in the collapse of the manslaughter case against Belize City businessman Ben Bou-Nahra have been convicted by the department’s disciplinary panel. According to a police press release, today a police tribunal found Clement Cacho, Darius Ramos and Anthony Polonio guilty of […]
Eight days after a San Pedro Credit Union was hit by armed robbers, thieves decided to target a gambling house in the island town. According to police reports, around four on Tuesday morning, two masked men broke into Casino Belize, located on Coconut Drive and stole fifty-nine thousand nine hundred and thirty dollars in cash […]
A labour dispute has slowed work at the site of the Vaca hydroelectric facility near Benque Viejo in the Cayo District. Reports reaching News Five indicate that somewhere near eighty of the two hundred eighty workers employed on the project have been off the job since yesterday. They have complained of low wages and poor […]
On last night’s newscast we reported that ninety-three candidates had signed on the dotted line and paid their deposits for the February seventh general election. Tonight News Five’s Janelle Chanona has their names. In the Freetown Division, the P.U.P.’s Francis Fonseca squares off against Michael Peyrefitte of the U.D.P., with Jorge Ernesto Babb as an […]
And in other campaign news, it appears that there will be at least one formal political debate … and it will take place in Orange Walk. A release from BELPAC, Belizeans Promoting Active Citizenship, reports that last night the local civic group met with representatives of the P.U.P., U.D.P., and N.R.P. and agreed to debate […]
Most of the damage from Hurricane Dean has been repaired but today we learned of one casualty that has yet to be dealt with. It involves fifty-three year old Alfred White senior, a resident of Corozal who, in the wake of the storm, could not cope with his new situation. The mental patient has been […]
With a rate of population growth among the highest in the Caribbean, need for new classrooms never ends. Today one Southside Belize City school found some breathing space and took time out to celebrate its good fortune. Ann-Marie Williams, Reporting Over two hundred fifty students in standards two, three and five of St. Luke Methodist […]
Superman, at one time may have found a phone booth to be a convenient venue for switching identities … but in the age of the cellular do we really need pay phones? Actually, we do, and this morning News Five’s Janelle Chanona found out why. Janelle Chanona, Reporting Belize’s first pay phone was installed in […]
It’s a constituency rich in history, encompassing a major city of the ancient Maya as well as the prime logwood swamps so favoured by the early Baymen. But tonight Belize Rural North is in the news, not because of its past, but because of its future. Ann-Marie Williams reports from the campaign trail. Ann-Marie Williams, […]
There may be voters who will sit down and actually read both major party manifestos, weigh the relative merits of the two documents, ascertain their commitment to implement the proposals … and then cast their ballots accordingly. But if such voters exist, we’ve yet to find them. These days political manifestos are more about the […]
And speaking of candidates, we are reliably informed that the total number of people nominated in the nation’s thirty-one electoral constituencies is ninety-three. The Peoples’ United Party and the United Democratic Party each fielded a full slate while the National Reform Party and Vision Inspired by the People put forward eleven each. The National Belizean […]
Messages of condolence continue to pour in from around the world following the death on Saturday of Andy Palacio. And while we in Belize watched with enthusiasm as Andy’s career took off internationally it is only now that we are beginning to realise how far he had taken his music and, along with it, the […]
Our own relationship with Andy began even before this station made its first broadcast, when Andy was hired to compose the theme music for News Five. Over the ensuing sixteen years he has been no stranger, as we produced his first music video as well as twelve episodes of a musical variety show called—what else—the […]
For thirty years, St. John’s College has been publishing the journal Belizean Studies. This morning at SJC’s Princess Margaret Drive campus, the editors released a special issue on Archaeology in Belize. The publication features seven articles, some of which were penned by two of the country’s premier archaeologists: Doctors Jaime Awe and John Morris. For […]
There are thirty-one constituencies that will elect representatives next month but by no means are they all identical. The areas vary greatly, both in population and physical size. So while some urban candidates can walk the length and breadth of their division in less than an hour, others in certain districts may take days … […]
Belize’s most internationally recognized musician, Andy Palacio, finally succumbed to heart and respiratory failure, the result of a series of strokes. His death occurred around nine Saturday night. Belizeans were not unprepared for the loss as from the middle of last week Andy sought medical attention following complaints of dizziness and blurred vision. He was […]
The nation may be in mourning but life—particularly political life—marches inexorably forward. Today, in case you missed it, was nomination day, the day each candidate does his or her best to convince the media, the public—and in some cases himself—that victory is at hand. Our coverage begins with News Five’s Ann-Marie Williams and the People’s […]
The United Democratic Party presented their city candidates for nomination in the afternoon. News Five’s Janelle Chanona reports that, not surprisingly, the mood was upbeat. Janelle Chanona, Reporting This afternoon Mahogany Street was ablaze in red as the thirty-one candidates of the United Democratic Party made their way to the Administration Building to be nominated. […]
Their appearance at Mahogany Street may not have been accompanied by all the hoopla of the major parties but this morning a number of independent and third party candidates plunked down under their two hundred dollar deposits at Mahogany Street. News Five’s Marion Ali was there to greet them. Marion Ali, Reporting The first candidate […]
Exactly one week after the year’s first murder was discovered, the second homicide of 2008 has been reported. The corpse of fifty-seven year old Santa Elena resident, Raul Cortez was discovered around nine this morning off Prayer Mountain Road in Ontario Village, Cayo. The taxi driver’s body was found slumped over the steering wheel of […]
A robbery at a Dangriga nightspot has left the bartender recovering from gunshot wounds. According to police reports, just after midnight on Saturday, thirty-one year old Lorenzo Sabal was manning the counter at the Foco Rojo Bar at mile three on the Stann Creek Valley Road when two men, armed with a handgun, held him […]
