And inside the Football Federation of Belize, elections for the Premier League of Belize Executive Committee were held last week Wednesday, December 28th. The elections took place at the FBB Office in Belmopan and were carried out by the Electoral Committee. The outcome of those elections, are the following: The new President is Jaime O. Perdomo Jr. Vice President is Al Westby and fellow members are Celso Carcamo, Wilhelm Miguel and Onan McLean. At the event, the National Sports Council was represented by Patrick Henry. And while 2011 saw much upheaval in the area of sports; specifically football, 2012 promises to be a year of restructuring. We say this because the roadmap agreed to by the FFB, FIFA and the ministry of Sports appears to be holding, albeit with a few bumps in the road. So far, Six of the seven district football association elections have been completed. We spoke to Minster of Sports John Saldivar yesterday asking him for his opinion on the elections that have been conducted so far.
Hon. John Saldivar, Minister of Sports As you are aware Louis, a few months ago, the Government of Belize, FIFA and the FFB agreed on a road map that would see eventually new elections at the executive level and the Football Federation of Belize. However, before that could have happened, we had to have elections at the district and the members, which included seven district associations and the semi-pro league. We are now at a point where all but one of those elections have been held and so we now have new executives in all of those members expect for Corozal, which was postponed due to some controversies over the disqualifications if one of the slates that wanted to run. We are hoping that that can be resolved within a few days; as recent as today I sent a correspondence to FIFA to try to urge them to bring that a close, so that we can still meet the deadline of the roadmap which was set for March 10th as the deadline for conducting the executive elections for the FFB. So I believe we are still on track. There have been some bumps along the road; some people were disqualified; some slates didn't make it because of technicalities and not following the procedures and others were able to win their appeal and were able to get to participate in the elections. So by a large I feel that it has been a very good process and I look forward to the elections of the executive for the FFB sometime in February or March.These technical difficulties have manifested themselves in several districts; Corozal, where the process has stalled, and Belmopan, where the challenging slate members were all disqualified from participating in the elections because of a technicality.
We Asked the Minister to comment on the Belmopan elections.
Hon. John Saldivar If there was a slate that was rejected in Belmopan, I believe the slate form Mr. Alvarez was rejected for not following the proper procedure in filling out the nomination forms and getting the forms signed by authorized representatives. We win some, we lose some and I think we have done well overall in terms of having a transparent enough process that the ministry can now certify that the elections were free and fair.The elections for the executive Body of the Football Federation of Belize, FFB, is slated for march of this new year.
ELECTORAL COMMITTEE
FOOTBALL FEDERATION OF BELIZE
PRESS RELEASE: (January 16, 2012)
After reviewing the files for the Corozal Football Association, FIFA has determined that the decisions of the Electoral Committee and the Election Appeal Committee stand.
As a result, elections for the Corozal FA will be held this coming Sunday, January 22, at 11:00 a.m. at the Calcutta Community Center.
(Ed. Note: What this means is that there will be another "endorsement" election in Corozal on Sunday, since the challenging slate nominations have all been rejected by the FFB's Electoral Committee and Election Appeal Committee. The entire slate of challengers was also rejected in the Belmopan FA elections, which turned out to be an endorsement of the incumbents. None of the FFB's incumbent district FA slates have had even a single nominee rejected by the Electoral Committee. Neither was any nominee rejected on the two slates that contested the Premier League executive elections.
The deadline for nominations to the FFB Executive elections is yet to be announced. There have so far been no disclosure to FFB Members of the details of the nomination process. The incumbents are again in the "driver's seat", and the challengers have absolutely no room for error on their nomination forms under the present FFB appointed Electoral Committee and Election Appeal Committee.)
While politics is playing out in anticipation of municipal elections in March, there is another election that has had its fair share of controversy as well. The Football Federation of Belize has also been having elections. When we caught up with Minister of Sports John Saldivar, he commented on the FFB elections.
Hon. John Saldivar, Minsiter of Sports I think that the entire process has had its ups and downs, but generally speaking, yes I am satisfied with what has taken place and the opportunity that has now been afforded to the football community to elect transparently their new executives. We have concluded all except one, the final branch elections will be this Sunday. I feel that the opportunity was a good one and the process was a good one and at the end of the day, the best persons for the job, as considered by the football community, will be elected.
This Sunday's election is for the Corozal Football Association. FFB's upcoming Congress is set for March 15 and the Electoral Committee is now accepting nominations for elections to the Executive Committee of the FFB. Nominations must reach the FFB Secretariat by 4:00 pm on Monday, February 6th.
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