AmbergrisCaye.com Home Forums Talk Belize Chat Area I Miss Ronald Reagan

If I remember correctly, the illustrious Kerry was collecting purple hearts (by report, at least one of them was band-aid worthy) to get sent home early. Bush was a pilot of a plane type that was not used in VN. So many facts, so little time.

Forced to resign, how dare they let him. He should be forced to stay with the party, so the other side can use him as an example of everyone in the party.

Pick a group, again, not one more noble in the extreme than any other.

And I'm sure that Democrats are very annoyed that their usual tactics are being used against them!

So help me get this straight.....Repubs call all non whites by racist epithets and Dems call women they don't agree with Whores?

Throw them all out....vote for a dope smoking Libertarian!

The job of the Federal Government: Defend our borders, fix the roads and deliver the mail, (although even thats not too important anymore.....)

PM Barrow in Mexico
posted (October 19, 2010)
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Prime Minister Dean Barrow is on an official visit to Mexico. The government of Belize has not provided any details of his trip - but the Mexican government has posted video and photographs on their website.

We got this from the official welcome by President Felipe Calderon:�.

President Felipe Calderon
"It is an honor for me to receive the Prime Minister of a country which is so close in geography as well as in the affection of all Mexicans. Your visit is of the highest significance for us because it coincides with the year in which we celebrate the bi-centennial of our Independence and the centennial of the Mexican revolution. Your presence in Mexico constitutes a great opportunity to ratify the very affection of friendship that unites our people and to strengthen strategic relationship we have built."

"Aside from friendship and cooperation in recent years we have strengthen our economic exchanges. Only this last decade bilateral trade double from 52 to 104 million dollars in 2009."

"I am sure that the talks we will be holding through this visit shall give a new projection to our 2 countries trade and investments thus, we have undertaking works to modernizing the roads, electric and telecommunications connection between our nations. Mr. Prime Minister and I say this with great pride that Mexico was the first country to establish diplomatic relations with Belize immediately after the proclamation of its Independence on September 21st, 1981. Belize knows it has the friendship and support of all Mexicans to jointly build a future of wellbeing and prosperity for the benefit of our people."

The delegation includes Education Minister Patrick Faber, Foreign Minister Wilfred Elrington, Sir Manuel Esquivel, CEO in the Ministry of Finance Audrey Wallace and other senior government officials.

Transparency and Accountability: not Just Buzzwords
posted (October 19, 2010)
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We always hear plenty about transparency particularly as a mandate of the Barrow administration. But the truth is that since this government went to Belmopan, the ministry of finance has stopped releasing quarterly statistics, and cabinet briefs, and the government website is in a shambles.

But a new initiative will compel government by law to release timely accounting of the people's money as it is used in real time.

It is called Fiscal Transparency and Responsibility Regulations - legislation designed to increase government accountability.

The IDB is providing technical assistance and they held a workshop today to get everyone on the same page:�

Joe Waight, Financial Secretary
"The act requires that we publish a fiscal strategy statement, very detailed. Also, it requires that we report as you say in real time or next to real time as possible outcomes with the budget. We also explain deviations from targets and so�so it imposes a set of discipline on the government that may not have been there by law before. It makes our work in a sense a little more difficult but its puts a constraint on you and now you are required by law to provide these things to the minister, the minister in turn is required by law to submit to cabinet and then to post the information on our government website. So really what the law imposes is discipline, that is not an option; you must do it."

Jorge Von Horoch, IDB Principal Specialist
"For us the most important achievement with this new legislation is that under this new legislation the government will be required to inform to public society their fiscal objectives to report, to monitor what they are doing in the fiscal area. So now with the public society, the civil society will have the opportunity to see in the Ministry Of Finance website the development of the fiscal situation and what the government is expecting for the coming years."

Joe Waight, Financial Secretary
"Where the check and balance is going to come in is that the House can call on the minister to provide the information if he is late, the sanctions are on the technical people�."

Jules Vasquez
"Who from the house can all though because we know that the head of the executive regrettably is also the head of the legislator."

Joe Waight, Financial Secretary
"Well if there is a groundswell within the rank and file of the house they can do so."

Hon. Godwin Hulse, Senator - Business Sector
"We all know that is not going to happen. Who in National Assembly is going to pass a resolution to force the minister of finance who is normally the Prime Minister to report. We would wish that that would be put on the financial secretary the way it's put on the Auditor General that he has to then report and the national assembly can say well why Mr. Financial Secretary you haven't report? We supported it of course from the business sector because particularly myself as you rightly said have always supported this. There were a few flaws we saw with the S.I. however that we think amendments should be made to and I highlighted them earlier in the seminar here. The first was that the minister has a discretion to determine what should be and should not be in the reports. That's an absolute no-no. He should have no discretion whatsoever, you either understand the principle that the public business must be conducted in the public domain. So you cannot have, we all remember UHS please."

The new statistics are slated to start to be produced in April of 2010

WORKSHOP FOCUSING ON FISCAL TRANSPARENCY UNDERWAY
October 19, 2010

The Government of Belize and the Inter-American Development Bank are today holding a workshop to present the fiscal transparency and responsibility regulations legislation which was recently approved by government. Financial Secretary in the Ministry of Finance, Joseph Waight, says the legislation will impose discipline, transparency and accountability on the government.

Joseph Waight; Financial Secretary, Ministry of Finance

"Evolution is the new way of thinking internationally and also for Belize. That is government's have a greater responsibility to their citizens, to tax payers to be held accountable for the use of tax payers' money. In Belize we have economic challenges therefore we have to impose greater fiscal discipline on ourselves and also we have to ensure that the public has greater access to how governments resources are spent. After all we are spending resources on behalf of tax payers, on behalf of the citizens; not just on behalf of ourselves. It is an evolution and a new way of thinking, a new way of doing business, a greater responsibility to our tax payers."

Dalila Ical, Reporter

Now, you also said that there are some challenges that are going to be faced in Belize. Could you explain what challenges you are talking about?

Joseph Waight

"Well in addition to the regular budget challenges, there is never enough resources to do everything you want to at the same time so you have to prioritize and select and try to address those issues that are of the greatest concern for the public. The challenges that we face is that we are limited capacities internally. This will require more work and greater output on the part of the ministry of finance and the treasury department and others but the rewards will come because the investment in time, investment in effort, investment in money should yield in the medium and long term more efficiency, more confidence, more trust and a better working relationship with our electorate and with our tax payers in particular. Legislation is already passed; in fact it was a statutory instrument that was signed by the minister in early October. It went through the house and the senate and it is now law there is a commencement date. The commencement day actually takes it to the first of April 2012 to give the government time to put the procedures and structures in place to deliver the information needed. We made a commitment here to try to get it done earlier if possible but the commencement date is first of April for 2012, for that budge year."

Government received technical assistance for the drafting of the legislation by the Inter-American Development Bank through the Anticorruption Activities Trust Fund.

Joseph Waight

"The legislation requires ... first of all sets out the objectives but requires the government to give policy statements as to where it is going to go with its fiscal policies, sets targets, requires the government to do report on passed and explain the deviations. It requires the minister, the financial secretary to prepare these reports. It is delivered to the minister of finance. The reports have oversight from the Central Bank and from the auditor general. The minister of finance then submits to the house, the house has comments as well and then ultimately all of this should be published on the government website in a timely manner so that so that the citizens can see how the government is functioning and what use is being made of tax payers monies."

Present for the workshop were government authorities, members of the National Assembly, public sector agencies, private sector and civil society representatives.

EX SERVICES LEAGUE LAUNCHES POPPY APPEAL
October 19, 2010

The Belize Ex-Services League today launched the Scarlet Poppy appeal. The poppy is a symbol and tribute to all the men who lost their lives in World War I and II. This is the first activity leading up to a week of activities in honor of Veterans Week next month. President of the Belize Ex-services League, Bernard Adolphus, tells us more about the importance of remembering our war veterans and observing Veterans Week.

Bernard Adolphus; President, Belize Ex-services League

"Most of our men are senior citizens and they need help. Particularly what we are worried about is health care because we all know that the medical care is expensive. We get free attendance at the hospital and it is still being held true but medication is an expensive thing. The money that we collect from the poppys help us with well fair activity for example, purchasing medicine for these men. It is not only in Belize City; countrywide because we have a contingence in Punta Gorda, we have a contingence in Stann Creek, we have a group in Belmopan, we have a few in Cayo, we have some on Corozal and we have a few in Orange Walk. Whatever we do we do everything countrywide for our veterans because if it wasn't for these men and women who went forward perhaps it would have been a different Belize. That the way I look at it and that's the way everybody look at it."

Every year, the Belize Ex-services league sets aside seven days in November in which to prepare for the remembrance of those who have made contributions toward the development of Belize. The poppy is symbolic and Bernard says we all should wear it proudly.

Bernard Adolphus

"I'm requesting the public to support the poppy campaign buy a poppy; wear a poppy. School children, grand parents and parents wear a poppy in a symbolic gesture in remembrance of those who have fallen, those who are still her and those who have made the sacrifice. We have to remember those people and I trust all the family members will come out and support this venture on that day. The Ex- Service League is still alive and kicking."

Belize challenges preliminary IMF report

Author: Adele Ramos - [email protected]

At the recent annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank held in Washington, DC, last week, Prime Minister Dean Barrow, Governor of the Fund and the Bank for Belize, made representations on the draft annual report for Belize, due to go shortly before the board of the IMF, indicating that he was unhappy with some comments in the report, which he believes were influenced by two attorneys representing the Ashcroft group of companies: Belizean attorney Eamon Courtenay, SC, and former UK Attorney General, Peter Goldsmith, QC.

The report, based on a June-July 2010 visit to Belize, is already due out. In an interview with Amandala today, Prime Minister Barrow said that the report "was clearly influenced by representations by Ashcroft's crew."

He said that the Ashcroft reps "...want the IMF to include the kind of language that would reflect their grossly misleading and damaging charge that the investment climate in Belize has gone to hell, because of us resisting Ashcroft and his arbitration award."

The report did not exactly say that, said the Prime Minister. Although he classified the comments in the IMF report as "fairly neutral," he said he quarreled about the fact that this issue was even mentioned in the report.

"No other investor has ever made any representation," said Barrow, "This is one man," even though references are made of a host of Ashcroft-controlled companies, said Barrow, in an attempt to try to pluralize the allegation against the government.

"This is one man's vendetta - one man's campaign... He is on a campaign and he is powerful," the Prime Minister told us.

Along with Courtenay and Goldsmith on their visit to the IMF, said Barrow, was an American, a former official of the Bush Administration whose name he could not immediately recall.

Barrow said that he had also learned on his Washington visit that the Ashcroft group had sent the IMF a letter that Belize had not been privy to, and "which was the cause of a great deal of hard talk from our side�"

According to the Prime Minister, there was some language in the draft report with which he was personally unhappy. This, he said, would be sorted out at the board level. However, Belize won't know if the report will be modified until the final report is public.

Apart from this, said the Prime Minister, the report was not much different from the usual IMF reports.

A July 1, 2010, release from the IMF said that the meetings in Washington, DC, entailed policy discussions, looking at such areas as the economic outlook for 2010, as well as the medium-term, and the government's macroeconomic strategy.

The report noted, "Economic activity stagnated in 2009, as a result of the global slowdown and the lingering effects from the floods in 2008. Growth has resumed since late 2009, but the recovery is still narrowly based, while inflation appears to be picking up somewhat, driven by the rise in fuel prices.

"For 2010, the mission expects growth to resume modestly, and export prices and tourist receipts to recover slightly, allowing foreign reserves to stabilize at just over three months of imports of goods and services.


"Despite the recent tax revenue actions, the overall fiscal deficit is likely to widen in FY2010/11, owing largely to upward pressure on primary current spending and increased investment, while the public debt would remain high. The overall banking system appears liquid and well capitalized, but the mission is concerned about the rise in nonperforming loans (NPLs)."

The issue of non-performing loans has been highlighted as a concern by the Central Bank of Belize. As the country's leading bank, the Belize Bank, led by Ashcroft, had been reported recently as having a rate of non-performing loans about six times the prudential benchmark of 5%.

Mr. Barrow told our newspaper that the principal reason he visited Washington for the meetings was to address concerns over the IMF report on Belize.

On that trip, he also attended the annual meeting of the World Bank Group and the Commonwealth Finance Ministers Meeting (CFMM).

A Government press release issued today, Thursday, October 14, said that attendees discussed such issues as the world economic outlook, poverty eradication, economic development and aid effectiveness.

"Ministers mapped out strategies for continuing to deal with the impact of the global economic crisis," it added.

Other items of discussion were environmentally sustainable growth, as well as the debts of small and vulnerable states.

Adelante

On his day of crowning glory Sunday, when the leadership he won so narrowly thirty months ago was being endorsed publicly by the legendary PUP Leader Emeritus, Rt. Hon. George Price, and the previous PUP Leader, Hon. Said Musa, and by the "guided" PUP masses gathered in national convention, PUP Leader Johnny Brice�o must have experienced a small but nagging doubt as he contemplated, in the flesh, the almost Mephistophelian deal he had cut to remain as Maximum PUP Leader.

Essentially, Johnny accepted a deal which Mr. Musa had offered Mark Espat, which is to say like this: put my people in the key positions so that I have my party power reflected in the national executive, and you will be Leader. The indications are that Mr. Espat turned down that deal, because he did not trust Mr. Musa, based on their past history, and the way events unfolded, observers believe that Mr. Musa was all the while offering the same deal to Mr. Brice�o, who accepted.

The upshot of this is that the Albert and Lake Independence area representatives, Hon. Mark Espat and Hon. Cordel Hyde, whose support contributed substantially to Mr. Brice�o's surprise party leadership victory in March of 2008, are now demoted and sidelined, which is a good thing for us at Kremandala.

As it now is, Partridge Street has no obligation to either of the PUDP, whereas when Espat and Hyde are in PUP leadership positions, our family loyalty to them represents a restriction to our media freedom. It is a restriction which we have discussed openly with our readers several times before, so this is no big thing.

Understand, we wished and wish Mark and Cordel all the best, and would have accepted the restriction on our freedom had they returned to PUP prominence.

Party politics is a school of hard knocks. For sure Mark and Cordel know that well, because they spent eighteen of the last thirty-six months of the Said Musa 2003-2008 term of office on the back bench - twice removed from Cabinet. The indications are that their punishments at the hands of Prime Minister Musa contributed to the popularity of Mark and Cordel on Belize City's Southside. They were the only two PUP candidates in the seven Southside constituencies to win seats in the 2008 general elections. (There are really six Southside divisions, but since 2008, a seventh - Pickstock, added a Southside component.)

The national executive presented to the PUP faithful Sunday on the beach in Dangriga, represents a philosophical return to the neoliberal journey which the PUP began with their general election victory in September of 1989. There appeared to be a flirtation with the PUP's social justice origins in the first Brice�o leadership run, which began in March of 2008 and ended yesterday with the commencement of the second. This new Brice�o run will look very much like 1989 to 2008, and then there is the question of Lord Michael Ashcroft, the British and Belizean tax dodger who is in a telecommunications partnership with Johnny's family, or Johnny himself - take your pick.

We do not wish to project the post-convention PUP landscape too far into the future, because the PUP are in Opposition and they are on a losing streak since 2006. We should be nurturing them instead of being abrasive in any kind of way.

The absence of Florencio Marin, Jr., from the PUP national convention is, however, a troubling thing for the more introspective members of the PUP, in large part because his father, Florencio Marin, Sr. has been a PUP Northern Caucus powerhouse since 1964. That's 46 years. Florencio Junior defended his father's Corozal Southeast seat by just 15 votes in 2008, but still, he won in a general election where the pendulum had swung very hard in favor of the UDP. The absence of Mark and Cordel will be explained to the PUP faithful by PUP spin doctors as a Kremandala problem. You know Partridge Street is blamed by the Said Musa/Ralph Fonseca faction for many, many things. But, they can't blame Kremandala for Corozal Southeast. That is original, creation PUP territory.

There's an old song which goes like this, "There's something going on here, and you don't know what it is: do you, Mr. Jones?" Adelante.

Guided democracy

The above two words are, of course, an oxymoron. Democracy is the system where the will of the people prevails. Such a will should not be guided: it is to be expressed. Most Belizeans automatically give their support to the concept of democracy. In fact, this is so all over the world. Democracy is considered the ideal. There have been totalitarian, communist states which have actually referred to themselves as "democratic," just as there are oligarchic, capitalist states which say they are "democratic." Everybody wants to be "democratic."

The People's United Party has not been democratic for a long, long time. Whenever the party holds national conventions, these are really bread-and-circus exercises where the rank and file of the PUP are presented with personnel and resolutions which have been chosen and drafted, respectively, at Independence Hall on Queen Street in Belize City by a group of PUP insiders. There is no convention floor as such at PUP conventions where controversial matters can be debated and decided. This is considered too dangerous by the rulers of the party, because it may end up suggesting to opponents and the rest of Belize that the PUP is not completely united.

In 1983, there was a famous PUP national convention held where Said Musa challenged the incumbent, Louis Sylvestre, for chairmanship of the PUP, and lost. In 1996, there was a leadership convention where Said Musa defeated Florencio Marin, Sr., for PUP leadership. And then, in 2008 there was a leadership convention where John Brice�o defeated Francis Fonseca for PUP leadership. Other than these three occasions over the last fifty years, we cannot recall an occasion when the PUP general assembly, so to speak, was allowed to debate and decide any issue of consequence.

Understand, democracy can be a messy proposition, fractious and complicated. Democracy is not a religion. In politics, there are few specific rules, only general guidelines. The objective of electoral politics is to win elections, which involves obtaining the majority of votes cast on scheduled, specified election days. How a political party goes about obtaining that majority is not a matter of morality and ethics. Politics is war. It is a less violent form of war, but war nonetheless.

We think we understand how the PUP became a party of guided democracy. After September 1956, when a sensationally popular leader, Hon. George Cadle Price, took over the PUP following a putsch at Riverside Hall, there was really no need for functional democracy in the PUP. George Price became like a god, and PUP members and supporters adored him. Mr. Price led the PUP for forty years after taking over in 1956, and did not lose a national election until 1984. In other words, whatever he was doing worked perfectly well politically until 1984. And Mr. Price was, we submit, guiding the PUP's internal democracy.

After 1984, guided democracy did not work so well for the PUP. The previously invincible party began to lose critical elections, and in 1996, Mr. Price himself may have fallen victim to the system he created. He was forced to step down as PUP Leader when party insiders told him that the PUP's two most important financiers, Michael Ashcroft and Barry Bowen, would no longer support the PUP if he remained Leader. So it was that the legendary Mr. Price became PUP Leader Emeritus. This was not a decision of the PUP masses. This was not a democratic decision.

Today, as the PUP prepares for a national convention on Sunday, October 17, in Dangriga, the party's guided democracy is being disturbed by an alliance involving four of the PUP's six elected area representatives - Albert's Mark Espat, Freetown's Francis Fonseca, Lake Independence's Cordel Hyde, and Corozal Southeast's Florencio Marin, Jr. At one point a few weeks ago, this alliance included the former PUP Leader, Said Musa, who represents the Fort George constituency in the House of Representatives. But Mr. Musa cut a deal with Mr. Brice�o in order to have Musa loyalists be appointed to certain key posts in the 31-member PUP national executive. The most important of these key posts are those of the chairman and the secretary-general.

There are those who believe that Mr. Musa is positioning himself to overthrow Mr. Brice�o from inside the national executive at a time of his own choosing. There are those who believe that Mr. Musa regrets his decision to resign the PUP leadership in the immediate aftermath of the UDP's landslide general election victory in February of 2008.

In March of 2008, John Brice�o defeated Francis Fonseca, who was believed to be the leadership candidate chosen by Musa and Ralph Fonseca and who had been endorsed by Leader Emeritus Price, because there was essentially a popular revolt inside the leadership convention. PUP constituency chairmen could not control their delegates. Had the constituency chairmen been able to guide the PUP's democracy in March of 2008, Francis Fonseca would be the PUP Leader today.

On October 17, the delegate total will be four times larger than in 2008, so that the potential for convention floor democracy is even greater than in March of 2008. The thing is that, in the absence of a dominant and iconic leadership presence, such as Mr. Price represented for forty years, the PUP absolutely needs to find a direction which will be supported by a majority of Belizean voters. The PUP national convention is not being held in a vacuum. The party is not an island. So that, what the rank and file of the PUP think is more important now than at any time since 1956. On October 17, the PUP will be better served by more democracy and less guidance. We shall see.

Is this what is called a hijack?