national perspective june 26, 2011

Edition 148 Vol.3 week 43 Sunday, June 26th, 2011� e true voice of the silent majority� e true voice of the silent majority� e true voice of the silent majority

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Barrow bags BEL !Thursday, June 23, 2011BELIZE CITY: On Monday of this week, the Barrow administration again called a special sitting of the National Assembly and passed an amendment to the Belize Electricity Act that enabled it to expropriate the majority share-holding, approximately 71%, of the Belize Electricity Company. In an unemotional press release the Canadian company made note of the expropriation the following day: “On Monday, June 20, 2011, the Govern-ment of Belize (the “Government”) passed legislation and then issued an order, delivered on Tuesday, June 21, 2011, to expropriate the ownership interest of Fortis Inc. (“Fortis” or the “Corporation”) (TSX:FTS) in BEL and dismiss the Board of Directors of BEL, including nominees of Fortis. Com-pensation remains to be determined. “At expropriation, Fortis held an approximate 70% ownership interest in BEL, an integrated electric utility and the principal distributor in Belize, Central America, following investment at the invitation of the Government in 1999. Fortis also owns Belize Elec-

tric Company Limited (“BECOL”), a non-regulated hydroelectric generation business that operates three hydroelec-tric generating facilities in Belize. No expropriation order has been served in respect of BECOL. As at March 31, 2011, the assets of BEL represented less than 2% of the total assets of For-tis; the combined assets of BEL and

BECOL represented approximately 3% of the total assets of Fortis.” The Opposition Peoples United Party did not attend the session of the Na-tional Assembly citing the short notice and lack of consultation. In a press re-lease to the media on Tuesday it said: “While rumours circulated that the Government would introduce legisla-

tion at the House meeting to national-ise Belize Electricity Limited no such bill was included in the papers sent to members of the Opposition. “The Opposition condemns the prac-tice by the current Government of call-ing meetings of the National Assem-bly and then presenting major pieces of legislation to the Opposition when they arrive at the House of Representa-tives.” In interviews the following day the party’s leader John Briceno said that philosophically his party was not op-posed to “nationalization” but decried the manner in which the takeover was carried out. On Tuesday morning the new owners, operators and members of the Board of Directors of the Belize Electricity Lim-ited took control of the company and announced that Jeffrey Locke had been appointed the new Chief Executive Of-fi cer of the monopoly utility, and had been installed in offi ce. Locke is a former employee of BEL. It was also announced that Rodwell Williams, Prime Minister Dean Bar-row’s long time law partner and friend,

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Mike Menjivar out on bail

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Who is next on Barrow’s hit list?

Thursday, June 23, 2011BELIZE CITY: Belize’s nervous business community is rife with rumors that the Barrow administration has a list of possible takeover tar-gets and with the continued harassment against the Belize Bank, it is logical to question who is next in line. No one outside of Barrow’s Cabinet cabal knows for sure, but it is certain that the soured relationship between the bank’s principal owner Lord Michael Ashcroft and Dean Barrow has been the grist for the mill for the past three years. The possibility of a takeover of the nation’s largest private fi nancial insti-tution would’ve seemed remote until Barrow seized the majority sharehold-ing of the nation’s two largest private companies. On tonight’s Channel 7 News Barrow expressed confi dence that his expropri-

ation of Belize Telemedia Limited will be upheld by Belize’s appellate court. The judgment is scheduled to be deliv-ered tomorrow. The claim was argued before a trio of justices, Justices Dennis Morrison and Brian Alleyne as well as Justice Boyd

Belize Unit Trust folding

Thursday, June 23, 2011BELIZE CITY: The notice in last weekend’s newspaper hardly at-tracted much comment, coming as such amidst a year of record bank-ruptcies, foreclosures, receiverships and many businesses quietly clos-ing down – the Unit Trust Corpo-ration of Belize was calling on its depositors/investors to come collect their money because they too were closing their doors. The Unit Trust Corporation of Belize is essentially a mutual fund and their Belize operation is a sub-sidiary of the 30 year old and suc-cessful Trinidad & Tobago Trust Corporation. It debut here in 2003 and quickly grew to over 3,500 in-vestors but hardly fast enough or large enough, especially the past three years, to justify its continued

existence. The fund paid 7% for the fi rst fi ve years and seemed to be thriving but by 2008 it was forced to pull back. The Belizean managers have ex-plained that their headquarters is pulling the plug because at only $7.6 million in investments and forced to pay only 3.95% interest, it had become hardly worth the time and effort. It is to be noted that the Trinidad & Tobago UTC’s Total Assets Under Management fell from BZ$7.7 bil-lion to BZ$6.9 billion over the past two fi scal year. Reports are that savings have dipped in Belize, and indeed the Unit’s Belizean managers privately point to Belize’s sluggish economy and poor recovery prospects as fac-tors in their decisions to pull the plug.

Sunday, June 26th, 2011

In Belize, there is a total dis-connect by the majority of its citizens from the rest of the world. Beliz-eans have not yet grasped the reality that the word “Global Village” re-ally means that the world has become smaller. Indeed the world has shrunk, in particular, in the areas of communi-cation, and transportation has become more instantaneous. For example, a statement made on any of the local radio stations in Belize is immediately streamed via the internet and available in every seg-ment of the world. Similarly, a flight from Belize to Miami by plane takes one hour and forty-five minutes. The technology has brought the people of the world very close, so close that it is almost as everyone lives next door to Belize. When the Government of Be-lize decided on Monday that they will expropriate the sole supplier of elec-tricity in Belize, the Belize Electric-ity Limited (BEL), the world received this scary action of the Government instantly. The reaction of the world to the expropriation of BEL was imme-diate. The Rating Agents immediately locked on to the takeover of BEL as a negative economic activity. The Rating Agents has since proceeded to down grade the ratings of Belize on the international financial circuit. The opinion of the Rating Agents is viewed by the global financial sector

RECKLESS DECISION IN A SMALL WORLD

as credible and important and should not be disregarded when one is look-ing forward to investing in Belize. Since Monday, both major Rating Agents, Standard & Poor and Moody’s, scoffed at the expropriation of BEL and have issued a down grad-ing of Belize’s financial outlook. They looked upon nationalization of private sector assets as a primitive move, i.e. turning back the hands of time. In ad-dition they see it as creating larger Governments, and the popular world ideology is for smaller Governments. This down grade of the Belize rat-ing immediately affected the trading of the Belize stock value, the Super Bond, which is being held by inves-tors across the globe. While the local public in Be-lize rejoices that the UDP Government took away BEL from the majority shareholder, Fortis Inc., on Monday,

the Belizean business community on the other side has opposed the idea of nationalization. They are opposed to it because they contend in their press release on Wednesday that foreign investors will interpret the expropria-tion of BEL, which is the second of its kind with the first being BTL, as no company or industry is safe at the wrath of the Government. It is also clear that much thought has not gone into the effects on the Belizean economy about the expropriation of BEL, which is the same that can be said for the hostile takeover of BTL, because had there been patience and proper negotia-tions. The Government would never have taken on such a monumental task to add to all the economic troubles it already has. The other back-lash to the economy because of the expropria-

tion will come in the last quarter of 2011 when the International Mon-etary Fund (IMF) visits to conduct its audit (Article 4) of the Government accounts and its activities. The pay-ment for BTL shares is overdue and soon the BEL shares will become due, which at some point the IMF will make all the share payments outstand-ing the full responsibility of the Gov-ernment. Such a decision will send the Government account into a tailspin as the overall debt will surpass the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This will further erode the rating for the coun-try of Belize by the Rating Agents. This will make the Belize bonds trad-ing value decrease substantially. In short Belize bonds will soon approach “junk bond” status. In short, the BEL expropria-tion can never be good for the Gov-ernment nor the country because ev-ery sober thinking individual agrees that all options were not exhausted be-fore the Government took over BEL. Note the BTL share has not instilled confidence in Belizeans enough for them to invest their money. To date, no strategic investor has come on the horizon for the minority position. The situation with BEL seems worse. In short, the Government will be stuck with a failing BEL for life, and God help us. OPEN YOUR EYES THE PEOPLE ARE AWAKE!!!


GSU’s Commander Marco Vidal cracks

and unleashes his venom on his seven-year old daughter

By Rhenae NunezThursday June 23, 2011BELIZE CITY: The story outraged Be-lizeans when images of bruised parts of the body of a seven year old girl were strewn across the media for all to see. The girl is the daughter of GSU Commander ‘Marco Vidal’ with his former common-law wife Estelita Romero. The girl and her siblings were hurriedly taken away from their mother after it was alleged that she could not care for them. Vidal applied for custody and then took the children; two boys and the little girl. Other reports suggest that the mother Es-

telita Romero left the children in the care of their maternal grandmother while she went down south to work. It was while they were with their grandparents that they were taken away.Sometime around the end of May the sev-en-year-old did something that offended her Step-mother DPP Cheryl-Lynn Vidal which was then put cross to her father by new Mrs Vidal. Unconfirmed reports are that she touched a doll that belonged to Vidal’s child with his new wife the Di-rector of Public Prosecutions Cheryl-Lyn Vidal. According to Estelita, the mother of the seven-year-old, it was Cheryl-Lyn who allegedly instructed that he corporally pun-ish the girl..

DPP Vidal went further to say that, “the conduct was grave enough to warrant the imposition of that form of punishment.” Trying to diminish the fact that the child was physically harmed DPP Vidal said in her release,“I was there when the child was corrected. Further, the doctor who exam-ined the child gave the least classification of the injury possible. Had she received one lash the classification would have been the same, so that report is by no means suggesting that force beyond permissible limits, legally, biblically or otherwise, was used.”In defense of her husband whose name has become synonymous with abuse, DPP

Vidal said that her husband is not an abu-sive father and that he loves his children. According to DPP Vidal, the biological mother, Estelita, has maintained minimal contact with the children while they were in their custody. She concluded that her husband’s grav-est concern is about the trauma that the children are experiencing “while they are being unnecessarily steered, coached and prodded.”Despite calls for disciplinary action by the police department, so far none has been initiated. Confidential sources to the National Per-spective reveals that when the biological mother, Ms. Estelita, reported the matter for action against Marco Vidal, the instruc-tions came from the Minister of Police, Doug Singh to Compol Crispin Jefferies was to ensure that the information is not entered in the regular daily ‘Sitrep’ Situ-ation Report and to have the report be ig-nored and no action to be taken. The DPP, Cheryl-Lynn Vidal, wife of Marco Vidal, also purportedly said that there is a sec-tion within the laws of Belize that allows for that type of corporal punishment. Some time ago when there was an allegation against another high ranking police officer, it was the same Minister of police that or-dered that the allegations be made public even before the investigations into the mat-ter concluded.The GSU is acting like a paramilitary unit under the instructions and command of the PM Barrow through the Minister of police even though two weeks ago on their week-ly call-in talk show which airs on Love FM, Commissioner of Police Crispin Jef-feries admitted that Vidal’s GSU answers to him, the Compol, but even with that, there has been no semblance of justice for the seven-year-old.

She was then strapped with a belt reports say.DPP Vidal has taken on the image of the wicked step-mother in this story after she admitted in a release on June 17th, the fol-lowing day after the story first aired in the evening newscasts, that she was present when the child was supposedly disciplined.

Mike Menjivar out on bail

By Rhenae NunezWednesday, June 22, 2011BELIZE CITY - The images of a busted up Mike Menjivar, 34, owner of La Cabana club in Belmopan are still fresh on our minds, so too are the images of his shot up home and two dead dogs in his front yard. This stemmed from an assault by the Gang Suppression Unit led by Commander Marco Vidal. This story has outraged people across the country who have called the various talk shows to voice their outrage and disappointment with the brutishness that this arm of the Belize Police Department chooses to oper-ate business. In the wee hours of Friday May 20, 2011, the home of Mike Menjivar was invaded by members of the GSU who were there purportedly to search for drugs and weapons. On their ar-rival they first shot at the security guard who was over at the club which is adjacent to the Menjivar residence. They then made their way over the Menjivar fence where they shot and killed two dogs that were behind the fence. During that time, someone called the Menjivars who were asleep to tell them that something was go-ing on at their house. It is alleged by police that Mike Menjivar started to shoot from inside the home. The GSU say that they knocked and iden-tified themselves before they went in. A spliced tape released by the GSU shows that they did knock and iden-tify themselves as police – but by then, two dogs had been shot dead and the security over at the club had been shot at but fortunately escaped unhurt. It was dark out and Menjivar could not see out from the house, however in his account from prison he related that in the little he could see out, he saw vehicles with private plates and in no way could have known that it was the police who were banging down his door and shooting (he says they shot first). In the police video an officer is heard asking another of-ficer why he was shooting at him. It appears the officer was overcome by fright and was shooting wildly. According to Mike Menjivar, he re-turned fire from inside which sent the police diving for cover. Menjivar’s wife Iliana was by then calling for the police to come because someone was breaking into their home and was about to kill them. The Belmopan police advised them not to open the door and that police was on their way. Two other calls were made to the po-lice during the ordeal to which the same advice was given, “Do not open the door, the police are on their way.”

They never showed up. During the assault the Menjivar home was rid-dled with bullets includ-ing the bedroom where their young children slept. The GSU made their way all the way into their home and Mike Menji-var, fearing for his life and that of his family, gave himself up while his family took cover in a walk-in closet. It is al-leged that Commander Vidal beat Menjivar up

so badly that his jaw was broken and he bled profusely from the mouth. He was then made to lay face down on the floor and allegedly told by Com-mander Vidal to drink his own blood. A search which lasted all day until shortly after six in the evening was conducted which yielded nothing – no drugs, no weapon. Mike Menjivar had only a few days prior returned to Belize after medical treatment in Guatemala for injuries he sustained in a motorcycle accident in which he was seriously injured. Shortly after six, Menjivar, his wife Iliana and their housekeeper were taken into custody. Mike was taken to the Belmopan hospital for a look-see by a doctor and then taken to the Belmopan Police Station where they were locked up for the weekend. On Tuesday May 23, they were taken to court in Belmopan where they were charged for nine counts of attempted murder, nine counts of aggravated assault and one count of damage to property (the latter charge is in relation to a GSU vehicle whose back tire was shot out).Menjivar and his pregnant wife and their housekeeper remained in prison until June 3rd when Iliana Chacon and the housekeeper Rumilda Perez received bail. Mike Menjivar re-mained in the pen until Wednesday June 22nd, when his attorney Arthur Saldivar successfully demonstrated that his client was in need of medical attention. The bail hearing for Mike Menjivar commenced last week but was adjourned when prosecution counsel Trenia Young, objected to the bail because Menjivar’s applica-tion did not show any special reason for bail.That special reason was presented in an affidavit by Dr. Joel Cervantes. In it Dr. Cervantes attested to hav-ing Mike Menjivar in his care after a “near fatal” motor cycle accident on October 17, 2010. Menjivar remained in a coma for days and because of in-jury to his brain known as diffuse ax-onal. Menjivar has missed one of his follow up treatment with him due to being locked up. He has other treat-ment, including an MRI, scheduled. Mike Menjivar’s bail was set at $25,000.00 with the conditions that he surrendered his travel documents and that he does not interfere with any witnesses. He was also to report to the Belmopan police station once a week but that was withdrawn af-ter Arthur Saldivar objected citing safety concerns for Menjivar. The charges of attempted murder, damage to property and aggravated assault still stand against Mike Menjivar, his common-law wife Iliana Chacon, and their housekeeper, Rumilda Perez.


I strongly disagree with Dean Bar-row, Mose Hyde and Louis Wade on the matter of the expropriation of Fortis’ majority shareholding in Be-lize Electricity Limited. They believe it is good for the people and nation of Belize – I believe that it is reprehen-sible and it damaging to us in every aspect. Since this is a family newspaper I will respect our social construct and not use “bad words,” that is refrain from cursing but because I am so frustrated, I would like to curse long and loud. I do not regard any of these gentle-men as idiots or of being any less in-telligent than I am. I believe, based on my personal knowledge of both Mose and Louis, that my disagree-ment with them is more philosophi-cal, and that we may be irreconcilably positioned in that regard. Ironically, in their case, we would all argue that our positions are rooted in our belief in the welfare of and our confidence in our people. Fundamentally Dean Barrow has once again lied to the Belizean peo-ple for the base political expediency of trying to get his party re-elected. And history has shown that the pro-motion and perpetuation of narrow self-serving political agendas almost always, invariably, ends up harming the national weal. The Government of Belize did NOT have to expropriate Fortis’ shareholding in BEL. It is wrong in doing so. Our electrical supply was only threatened because the Govern-ment of Belize through its agency, the Public Utilities Commission, has been engaged in a hostile takeover of the company from the time it as-sumed office. It is clear to me that Fortis’ wished to sell its shares the moment it recog-nized that Barrow and Company was lusting after its assets. To paraphrase a just released report to Belizean bond holders, Belize is not a country “... with transparent and non-discrim-inatory guidelines for expropriation, ones with fair compensation policies and with access to due process. Ex-propriation for public welfare is le-gitimate whereas expropriation for political purposes is to be avoided.” In my opinion the Prime Minister’s insistent that BEL is bankrupt or in-solvent is disingenuous because he knew that the company doesn’t have “insurmountable” debts. The public record is that it has less than 30% debt - most Belizean businesses are currently operating with 50% debt. As one of my friends said to me: “BEL is only cash broke like every business on Albert Street right now.” The company has more than $430M in assets, by anyone’s accounting (and I’ll comment some more on the accounting issue later on in this essay) and has a lot of collateral on which to borrow. But the unassail-able fact is that the banks would not lend BEL money because they do not trust the PUC and the Barrow admin-istration. Turns out they were right. The Prime Minister knows that the company always has tight cash flows during the dry season when the cheaper hydro power is not abundant. He knew that the hostility evidenced by the administration through the PUC towards Fortis/BEL was hurt-ing their ability to secure financing. He knew that Fortis would not only

Extrapolating the expropriations by extension

not invest another penny in Belize un-der these circumstances, but that they wished to sell their stock in BEL. He knew that this year’s cash flow shortage was been exacerbated by oil prices averaging over $100 per bar-rel, coupled with a longer than aver-age dry season, because that meant the highest rates from Mexico since 2008. Mexico’s rates have been high-er than what BEL charges customers and the PM knew because he was sent copies of their daily rates. Dean Barrow knew that oil prices were likely to fall back, and indeed as I write this on Thursday, June 23rd, the WTI-NYNEX crude spot price had fallen to US$90.00. Even as he stood in the House last Friday making his case Dean Barrow knew that the rainy season is already here and because the reservoir level at Challilo is rising, BEL not only does not need another penny of help from GOB, but by December would be in good shape. Dean Barrow knew that not only had BELCOGEN’s early production problems helped to exacerbate the cash flow problem because it meant more procurement of higher cost Mexican power, but again, even as he stood making his case in the House last Friday, that Belcogen was being paid out of BEL’s collections, and that there was no danger to the sugar industry. In fact his good friend and support-er Senator Godwin Hulse has been making that same point whenever anyone would stop and listen. Dean Barrow also knew that BEL had paid the overdue amount to EIB out of the $4m GOB had pre-paid, to avoid a country default since it is a GOB loan that was on-lent to BEL. Dean Barrow knew all this because his longtime friend and law partner Rodwell Williams is not only the Chairman of BEL’s Board of Direc-tors, but is also the chairman of the audit committee that approves the company’s financial statements. Dylan Reneau, the President of the NTUCB, also sits on that three-person audit committee, (there is one other director from Fortis) so the committee is majority controlled by the Government/SSB/NTUCB. What this means is that when John Avery, the Chairman of the Public Utilities Commission, goes on the morning talk shows as he has done all this week, and says that BEL is mis-representing its finances in its audited financial statements, he is also saying that Rodwell Williams and Dylan Re-neau are liars as well. I have heard former BEL President and CEO Lynn Young say over and over that all they were asking was that the GOB/PUC give the banks as-surances that the issues between the regulator and the distributor would be resolved and they would be able to access the bridge financing they

needed. I never heard anywhere that BEL was asking for an “unlimited rate in-crease”. The assertion is preposter-ous. The 44 cents rate is not the prob-lem. It’s the high cost of power from Mexico that is the problem. I bought BEL’s explanation that that rate was set in 2007 when oil prices were $60 per barrel. With good hydro production and good production from BELCOGEN, BEL was ok through 2008, 2009, and 2010 as oil prices “roller-coastered” from around $60 in July 2007, to near $150 in July 2008, to below $40 in February of 2009, and having risen steadily since then to $115 in March of this year. Dean Barrow knows that we have to continue to diminish our reliance on Mexican energy, or at least he would’ve known that if his adminis-tration had an energy policy. Dean Barrow knows that when BNE “bought” out Blue Sky they ef-fectively killed Belize Aquaculture Limited’s heavy fuel plant since they would have to buy expensive import-ed fuel. He should be prevailing on BNE to recommence selling “our” oil to BAL at a cost recovery price. In my opinion this Barrow adminis-tration, and quite possible the next, if there is a next, has absolutely no in-tention of paying for its expropriation of BTL, BEL and most of the lands they have “quitared”. Their cabal is reaping handsome benefits from these acquisitions but the intention is to leave the bill for some future ad-ministration. Like I said it is only an opinion, mine, and I stand by it. All those people who philosophi-cally believe that “Belizeans should own the essential services” are being taken for a ride. Philosophically I am opposed to anyone owning anything at anytime if it does not make good economic sense for the people of Belize. That is my bottom line. Any-thing else means that we the people will be unduly paying for it. In this particular case, I predict that Barrow and his people, Fortis and the lawyers will all be laughing all the way to the bank, at our expense. There has been a complete failure to attempt mediation on the part of the Government and that alone indicts the administration. Fortis/BEL had nothing to gain from a protracted hostile relationship with the administration and the PUC, and everything to lose. Its former CEO Lynn Young told me via an email: “The banks can-celled our overdraft because of PUC actions to reverse approvals going back as far as 7 years. So we (did) not have $10M OD (overdraft) available until PUC issue is resolved. In addi-tion, Government increased our taxes by $8M. In addition, before 2008, our legal fees averaged $150,000 per year. Last year it was $4 million. So

between the loss of OD, the tax, and legal fees we (were) out $22 M. If it were not for the tax and the PUC issues, we could easily have met all our bills.” Sounds fairly straightforward to me. I am not persuaded that Dean Bar-row treated with Fortis in good faith, and listening to the tenor and tone of John Avery’s interviews it is clear that he has a “beef” with his former employers. I strongly disagree with John Av-ery that the PUC is there to look after consumers’ interests. I think the PUC should be there as an honest broker, an impartial referee, an agency for the greatest good for all stakeholders, and not biased towards any one or the other. I have a horror of politically con-trolled companies. I’ve been victim-ized by them before, and expect I’ll be victimized by them again. There is no social promise in all this, being enunciated. Despite all his talk about BEL inflating expenses et cetera, I note that John Avery, and to some extent Barrow, stop just short of promising lower rates. We’ve been down this road before - in August 2009 Barrow seized the majority shareholding in Belize Tele-media Limited and so far none of his promises then have come to pass. For the record I opposed that expro-priation too, and just like this one, it started out on a veritable tsunami of popularity with the electorate and then over the course of 5 months started to swing to the other end of the pendulum. According to the polls that tide is going out now. Populism might be good politics but it is not good public policy – just ask Hugo Chavez. Barrow could have bought out For-tis if he wanted. Here’s Lynn Young’s take on the sale talks: “He (Barrow) said Fortis gave a take-it or leave-it position. That’s not true. He asked me to find out if For-tis wants to sell and get an indication of the price. Fortis told me yes, and that they would expect fair value and that the $36M reversal that is being disputed in court should be taken into account. After relaying the message, I told him that Fortis would give him an official response through their at-torney Eamon (Courtenay). Eamon wrote him to say that Fortis would entertain a proposal. “Joe Waight (the Financial Secre-tary) writes back to say that he inter-preted my message to be a take-it or leave-it position. Eamon wrote again to reiterate that Fortis’ position is that they would be willing to entertain a proposal.” This is bad business. Fortis’s stake in BEL is worth at most $200 mil-lion. Barrow could have offered to pay in installments over 5 years, then borrowed enough money up front to make the first installments and start a sinking fund, as well as dedicate the profits on a 10% rate of return to that fund. I am sure some bank or finan-cial institution would’ve bought it. Nobody thought of at least asking about a debt for equity swap? Even-tually GOB could have gotten a con-trolling interest in the company that way.

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KREMANDALA $ELLOUT

“X” CAN’T CRITICIZE BARROW & THE UDP

Wilfully ignores the Corrupt Practices of Barrow and the UDP

A PAID AD

Can’t be TRUSTED!!!

He has been bought and paid for...Silent on issues affecting black South-side Belizeans while pretending to be their guardian

Barrow bags BEL !would continue as Chairman of the Board of Directors, and the Government and So-cial Security Board appointed directors Anthony Michael, Dennis Jones and Dy-lan Reneau, would also continue to serve. Dr. Carla Barnett, Anuar Flores, Louis Lue and John Mencias were appointed to replace the Fortis directors ousted as a re-sult of the takeover. The Prime Minister then left for Guate-mala City to attend an international con-ference to garner support for the U.S. led Central America Security Strategy. A release today from the Mexican Em-bassy in Belize said that Barrow met with the President Felipe Calderon of Mexico. Barrow had said that he would be seeking to persuade the Mexican government to assist in getting the Mexican power com-pany CFE to double Belize’s credit from the ten million dollars. The Mexican Embassy release would only say that: “As per the energy power supplied by Mexico to Belize through the Federal Commission of Electricity (Comi-sion Federal de Electricidad, CFE), Presi-dent Calderon reiterated Prime Minister Barrow the Mexican Government’s com-mitment to identify options that will main-tain the electricity supply, taking into con-sideration the current situation in Belize.” In a sharply worded release on Tuesday the Belize Chamber of Commerce con-demned the takeover, saying that it did not believe that it was necessary for the Gov-ernment of Belize to forcibly expropriate BEL. It noted that while: “The Government of Belize has both the power and the duty to create an enabling environment where domestic and foreign investors feel wel-comed and are encouraged to create jobs, introduce new technologies and improve the economy and thus the quality of life for all Belizeans ... when that power is not used prudently, it can severely undermine investor confi dence and destroy the econ-

omy. It also pointed out that while the Prime Minister publicly announced that he was affording BEL 20 days to fi nd a solution, well before the expiration of that period, “in haste and in the shroud of secrecy, he convenes a Special Sitting of the House and the Senate and once again abuses the norms of our parliamentary democracy and legislative process to expropriate the company in one day.” The Chamber also lamented the lack of mediation to fi nd a solution to the differ-ences between the parties. On Wednesday the Barrow adminis-tration replied in same vein saying the Chamber took “extraordinary liberties with the facts” and calling some of their assertions “patent nonsense” and “politi-cally inspired”. On Monday the business sector’s rep-resentative Senator Godwin Hulse had voted against the expropriation and had condemned the move during the debate. On Tuesday the international credit rat-ings agency Standard & Poor said that it

may cut Belize’s already poor credit rat-ing because of the expropriation. S&P, which rates Belize’s foreign and local debt B, fi ve levels below investment grade, said in a statement that it cut the outlook on Belize’s credit to negative, saying that “This transaction has the po-tential to increase the government’s al-ready high debt level substantially and weaken its debt-servicing capacity”. Just last week Standards & Poor had an-nounced in its 2011 report of countries’ credit ratings and in their evaluation of a country’s ability to meet its debt obli-gations in full and within the prescribed time, that they had rated Belize a “B”, which is considered a speculative grade. A “B” also means the country is “more vulnerable to adverse business, fi nancial and economic conditions but currently has the capacity to meet fi nancial commit-ments.”S and P also listed Belize at number nine on the top ten countries that are least like-ly to pay its debts. The investor ratings service Moody’s

has also said it would be considering low-ering Belize’s already low rating. On Wednesday the Belize Business Bu-reau joined the Chamber in their disap-proval of the expropriation. The Bureau cited the increase in Belize’s already high public debt and the furthering of the lack of available working capital to the private sector as two reasons why it views the move with disapprobation. The Bureau also cited what it calls a lack of honest and constructive commu-nication between the public and private sectors as another contributing factor to Belize’s economic woes, and said that there was a need to revive the national economic council. Meanwhile several of BEL’s former top managers who walked out of their offi ces last Saturday have been re-employed by Fortis at BECOL. Public Utilities Commission Chairman John Avery has hit the morning show cir-cuit to buttress the takeover. Avery is be-ing challenged by Belize’s auditors and accountants who question his assertions that BEL’s audited fi nancials are not a true representation of the company’s op-erations. One auditor is on record as asking John Avery to explain “what or who has given him the power to effectively accuse CSB (BEL’s auditors) of collusion. He needs to be reminded too, that the audited fi nancial statements are MANAGEMENT’s REP-RESENTATION! He must be made to understand that he has been accusing the board (and in particular its Chair and Dy-lan) of impropriety.” Rodwell Williams, the Prime Minister’s law partner is both the Chairman of the Board of Directors and the Audit Com-mittee, and Dylan Reneau, the President of the NTUCB, is also a member of both. It should be noted for the record that so far the Barrow administration has made no offer to Fortis, and in fact has expressed a preference for the company to fi le in the Belize Supreme Court for compensation.

Continued from page 1


The current state of affairs in this nation is creating a lot of con-fusion in my mind. Obviously the residents are divided on several is-sues and I believe that political po-larization is superseding good gov-ernance. Depending on whom you are and which major political party you support, this has a tremendous impact on how you view the current national issues that are resounding in this nation. I’ll try to specifi cally re-fl ect on the recent major issues, the most prominent now being the Gov-ernment appropriation of the Belize Electricity Limited, but not to lose sight of the other issues that I believe are unresolved. We have the matter of the unre-solved bus controversy, the matter of the Government of Belize/Ministry of Sports vs. The FFB and the sub-sequent suspension of Belize from FIFA, there was the matter of the squatters on Chetumal Street, the to-tally atrocious, appalling and high-handed behavior of the elite security force that is named the G.S.U., fol-lowed by the matter of the head of the G.S.U. and the abuse of his seven year old daughter, that takes place in the home of the Director of Public Prosecution. So to reiterate my original point, it is confusing based on the reaction of the Belizean public, especially on the talk shows. Prime Minister Barrow administra-tion’s amendment to the Belize Elec-tricity Act giving it the authority to appropriate the company seems to be one that he describes as being in the best interest of the Belizean people. The Prime Minister’s justifi cation is that the electric company that had the majority shares in the hand of foreign investors has found itself in a situa-tion where it is not meeting its debt obligation. The investor’s represen-tative from the company have been saying to the nation for a while that the Public Utilities Commission, which is the regulatory body for util-ity companies in Belize, have been putting undue pressure on the elec-tric company, thus affecting the com-pany’s ability to access funding that is necessary for the smooth opera-tion of the company in it’s mandate to provide the nation with electric-ity. According to the company’s now previous C.E.O. Mr. Lynn Young, the value of the company’s assets is in the neighbourhood of $450 million dol-lars. When you realize that the debt to the company is way less than $100 million dollars then it means that the company was not a company that was necessarily failing. Then, of course, your position will be based on what political persuasion you follow. Monday, after the emergency house meeting and the process to create the law that gives the government authority to take over B.E.L., it ap-peared especially in the mass media

that the entire procedure was life as usual. Channel 5’s Jose Sanchez, was the exception. He asked Prime Min-ister Barrow the bold question about the climate of investor confi dence to which the prime minister conceded that it is going to affect foreign in-vestment. But the prime minister feels that this is going to be popular at home. When we compare this with what happened with BTL in the same fash-ion of hostile take over the Prime Minister then also said that this was in the best interest of the Belizean people. In fact at that time he was confi dent that investors would be more than happy to buy back BTL. The difference with BTL and BEL is that at the time BTL was a profi ting business, and still the cash strapped government is left with the operat-ing cost of BTL, without being able to pay compensation for the value of that company. On the other hand BEL, according to the prime minis-ter, is a failing company therefore the Government will have to invest capi-tal when it is required and as well as it inherits the outstanding debts of the company. The acquisition of BEL now raises our national debt by over seven hundred million dollars. But the most signifi cant issue to me is how the Belizean people view the situation, and again I must compare that to when the Government took over B.T.L. - the country supported it, and again, the country seems to be in support of the take over of BEL. Of course, the news of BEL will not be fi nished today. One of the other issues that is very pressing has to do with that of the football controversy. The minister of sports has made it a selling point on his agenda to get rid of FFB president Dr. Bertie Chimilio. And there’ve been investigations and de-registra-tions, and back and forth between the Football Federation of Belize, some of its affi liates and the National Sports Council. It seemed to reach tipping point when the government wrote to the international president of FIFA, Mr. Joseph Blatter, basically asking for Belize to be suspended from FIFA because that seems to be one of the sure ways of getting rid of Mr. Chimilio. Again it appears the Belizean peo-ple seem to be overwhelmingly in support of the government in this re-gard. To this point it appears that over the past few days the government rat-ings may have gone up, because they seems to get massive public support for these events that can be described as high handed, and a blatant misuse of their power. But if the masses are in support of it, how can you ques-tion? And so that brings me to the fi nal pressing issue that I have and this one has to do with the alleged excessive use of force by Mr. Vidal, the head

Yesterday BTL, Today BEL, tomorrow it could be you

of the G.S.U. that was administered on his seven year old child. This took place in the home of Mrs. Cheryl-lyn Branker-Tait-Vidal, the Director of Public Prosecutions. Now the D.P.P. is the person who determines the lev-el of charges that is brought against someone accused of committing a crime. According to the medical report the doctor classifi ed the injuries to this child as harm, and harm is a crime under the criminal code of Belize. Now A.S.P. Vidal is a high ranking member of the Belize Police Depart-ment, and there have been precedents that when police are under investiga-tion, the investigative fi le is sent to the DPP. Now you understand where the confusion comes in. Mrs. Vidal

in her capacity as the DPP came out in the public domain to explain that although the doctor had classifi ed it as harm the force used by her hus-band against her stepdaughter was justifi able. Now on this issue people are expecting the authorities to be sensitive to public outcry, but this is a clear case of “Yu haf to be careful of weh yu wish fa”. The point is that when you clap and wave when the government is high handed and abu-sive like in the case of the takeovers, it’s only going to be a matter of time before the abuse and the high-hand-edness come knocking at your door. Yestudeh da mi BTL, todeh da BEL and tomorrow it cud be you. Imagine the possibilities! Just my impartial view.

I have heard it widely and loosely said that our system of justice is “cor-rupt”. The same assertion was made by Dr. Herbert Gayle in his report on Male Participation in Violence in Belize. There was also the matter that was brought before the Court of Appeal which questioned if there was appearance of bias on the part of former Justice Denys Barrow, the brother of Prime Minister Barrow. And more recently is an investiga-tion into the conduct of Magistrate Sharon Frazer as she makes a bid for the offi ce of Chief Magistrate. Put all these together and there is enough to shake our confi dence in our juridical system.Since 2003 I have been trying with no success to get a matter into the courts after my vehicle was damaged in an accident by a delivery truck owned by Santiago Castillo Limited and driven by one of their employees. I have gone to see the Commissioner of Insurance, I have gone to see on numerous occasions the insurer for Santiago Castillo Limited and I have spoken with “Registrars” at the courts and my so-called friends in the legal business. I have come to learn that it is indeed a business because if you don’t have the money, no one cares to hear jack squat from you. Finally former Prime Minister of Be-lize, Said Musa heard my calls for help and reached out. His son Ka-reem Musa who is also an attorney has been as supportive as is possible. My case was fi led in 2009 and that is where it has basically remained since then. I have made numerous inquiries at the court to fi nd out the status of my case. I am left very skeptical of some the people who work in the court system. I ran into problems since having lost my job and thus being unable to pay my loan for the vehicle. In a hearing that I thought was basically to throw me under the bus, I was hauled before the court and ordered to pay $250.00 monthly. I did not because I could not! I explained my circumstances at the time to the court but they insisted that I pay the amount as was ordered. I told the court during that session that I have a pending matter which is related to the court. The same per-son that heard that matter I was later

Claim No: 537 OF 2009made to understand is responsible for scheduling cases. It follows to me then that she would be aware of my pending case, yet I was not afforded any relief.Months passed and my employment situation deteriorated and I was sum-moned back to court. Thankfully it was before a judge who decided on a lower rate of payment which I have been doing my best to honor. I cannot help but feel that there are people in the system who direct their diabolical campaign against people like me. Ordinarily I would not be so suspi-cious but the rudeness that I have en-countered from some fi gures around the court makes me wonder. My at-tempts to fi nd out about the status of my case since I returned to Belize in February of this year have been fu-tile. I have encountered evasiveness and outright dishonesty on the part of some offi cials of the court that I have sought information from regarding my case. I have attempted to see the Chief Jus-tice last week but was told that he does not see members of the public. So I turned around not knowing what else to do other than to picket the Su-preme Court. I have not lost faith that my case will be heard eventually, but by the time it comes around I will have been out triple what I lost for my vehicle. It has been a painfully frustrating exer-cise for me. I remember at one point talking to the Prime Minister to seek his intervention in the matter with Mr. Santino Castillo whose company vehicle cause the destruction to my vehicle. That all fell on deaf ears – what was I thinking? Me dah PUP and he the PM is UDP, no way that he would do anything for a PUP! I take some comfort in that there are many who are being pushed around and pushed aside by the system. Last Friday I met Hirian Good at the court. She was there trying to get answers on her case after she was terminated by the Government of Belize be-cause according to her employer, she is PUP. Hirian’s case has been languishing as well. The court may argue back saying that is so because

Continues on page 7


Burning IssueBy:Nuri Muhammad

Visit our new website www.nationalperspectivebz.org e-mail: [email protected]

of an endemic problem of the back-log in the court system. Fair enough but still a tough pill to swallow when cases that were fi led after mine have gotten their day in court. My sense of humor is exhausted be-cause of the perception that some people in the court system seem to want to make my life diffi cult. I have been without a vehicle for sev-en years and counting – I have lost way more than I am claiming in this matter. I wonder if I was seriously in-

Spot CheckContinued from page 6

jured or killed as could have been the case if I didn’t have the presence of mind to step from between the vehi-cles – if the matter would have been swept under the rug.It is hard for me to attribute my not being able to get a simple matter be-fore the courts to the back log in the courts, rather I am of the opinion that some people are hell bent on making my life tough because they don’t like me for whatever reason.

Consultation is a word that is thrown around quite a bit in Belize these days. It’s supposed to mean that before major policy decisions are taken by government that there is a process where the views of con-cerned citizens are given full ventila-tion. This exercise, as sacred as it is to the democratic process, is usually manipulated by governments, and in the end turns out to be nothing but a puppy-show, especially since gov-ernment decisions are usually made long before. According to the House Rules, “consultation” is defi ned as special meetings held on specifi ed days, where the public is given an opportu-nity to express their opinion about a particular measure before the House. These Committee meetings, chaired by a member of the Cabinet, are usu-ally held in Belmopan and very little public announcement is made about its purpose, time and place; there-fore these consultations are not well attended by the general public and are usually only attended by interest groups. This is one of the reasons for the recent passage of three pieces of crime legislations without any oppo-sition. According to one report, there was no attendance at the “offi cial” consultations held to consider the proposed legislations. These Com-mittee meetings, following the House Rules, continue to be held in obscu-rity in Belmopan and have no input from the public. Consultation is also supposed to mean that the social partners, bodies like the private sector organizations, unions, teachers, churches, are con-sulted before there is any signifi cant shift in government policy. Real con-sultation means that “stakeholders” who will be affected by the particular decision of government will be can-vassed for opinions on the proposed measure; but this doesn’t always work, especially when a government, like this one, bypasses this protocol and passes measures without consul-tation with these social partners, as it did in the case of the recent acquisi-tion of BEL, a move which has far reaching implications for all partners in the governance process. While the sentiment of the general public overwhelmingly seem to sup-port government’s move in acquir-ing BEL, there was still not enough debate given to an issue that had to have been seen by both parties (gov-ernment and Fortis Inc.) months ago; clearly government had the Chair-manship of the Board, as its represen-tative, and must have known months ago the state of the company. Look-ing at the possible options that faced it shouldn’t government, months ago, have started some kind of consulta-tion with its partners, especially busi-ness, to look at the implications of a possible government nationalization of BEL? The bigger problem with the pres-ent consultation process, however, is that the average Belizean, the masses, is left out of the process. Why is this? Is it because it is assumed that they are already represented by opinions of the unions, business and churches? I suggest that the broad-base of Be-lizean opinion is not well canvassed through the so called consultation process used by governments to de-termine the pulse of the people before

WHAT CONSULTATION?it makes its decisions, and that gov-ernment need to be pro-active and change that consultative process to something more people centered. This is especially so when the issue is as huge as in the case of amending the Constitution to allow preventative detention. Will govern-ment open up the consultation pro-cess or will it rely on House Rules and hold obscure hearings in Belmo-pan? With the groundswell of oppo-sition to these measures by govern-ment the consultation process will no doubt be contentious. The dynamics of a real consultation process howev-er should be dynamic, and wide open

to as many opinions as possible. In the past, when this government faced major challenge to proposed legislation it held public consulta-tions in various community centers in all the district towns, including Belmopan and Belize City. Some were well attended, most were not. One example of how dynamic this process of public consultation can become was seen in the robust de-bate that took place in Belize City, at the Bishop Sylvester Center, back in 2008, around the issue of Dual Citi-zenship and their rights to serve in the House. It was explosive, and was a refl ection of the dynamics of a real consultative process. Unfortunately those of us who could not attend that session, and had to see it through re-corded playback, missed an opportu-nity to partake in a true consultation. More of what we need; Belizeans dis-cussing their issues. I have suggested in previous essays that we need to modernize our consultation process and include au-dience participation in the process. I have said that we have something to learn from Channel 5’s talent shows, where texting has become an interac-tive way that audiences observing the talents can text in their choice. Can’t this same thing be used to poll the opinions of the Belizeans on the “yea or nay” of the topic being discussed? We need to introduce state of the art technique to enhance our governance process and make it real, to today’s Belizean culture. Why can’t we feature these con-sultations as full blown productions,

asked to text GOB-TEXT, and the# 1 for “yea”, and the # 2 for “nay”. Can you imagine the excitement this will generate among people that their text (voice) counts? Certainly we can’t look at these expression of opinions or mini-ref-erendums as scientifi c – they are in

Consultation is also supposed to mean that the so-cial partners, bodies like the private sector organi-zations, unions, teachers, churches, are consulted before there is any signifi cant shift in government policy. Real consultation means that “stakehold-ers” who will be affected by the particular deci-sion of government will be canvassed for opinions on the proposed measure; but this doesn’t always work, especially when a government, like this one, bypasses this protocol and passes measures without consultation with these social partners, as it did in the case of the recent acquisition of BEL, a move which has far reaching implications for all partners in the governance process.

with all the lights, cameras, and mi-crophones to present to the audience viewing at home the signifi cance of the event? Kind of like the Presiden-tial Debates now taking place in the US; the production quality must be there to hold the interest of the view-ers. We should invite the most quali-fi ed persons to make presentations at these consultations so that the audi-ence will be better informed on the issues. We should give people access to participate through questions and comments coming through phone calls or text. At the end of each consulta-tion exercise the audience will be

the category of straw-polls like those done by Amandala and Channel 5, or even the daily Two-Cent Cam – but yet collectively, along with consul-tation with the social partners, they form a broad-base consultation with the Belizean people, the masses, be-fore the implementation of any major government decision. While this would advance the governance process tremendously by redefi ning consultations it is not something that most politicians are comfortable with. If they have to consult on every major decision be-fore they made it, this would result in slowing the process of decision making and reduce the amount of ac-complishments in one term. It would be almost like tying the hands of gov-ernment. For this reason the conven-tional wisdom among politicians is: The government was elected to gov-ern, therefore let it govern without in-terference; if at the end of their term you are not pleased, then vote them out. Politicians are afraid of a broad based consultation process because it can become cumbersome and expen-sive.” Government by referendum”, as they refer to it. The very idea is foreign to our system of government, yet this may be the only way to avoid the public suspicions of corruption that usually follows government de-cisions. We live at a time in Belize when people want to know what decisions their government is making, espe-cially when it involves their money; people want to have a say. It is clear from all the energetic calls in the morning talk shows and the opinions expressed through Two Cent Cam, and those interviewed by Channel 5 and 7News, that Belizeans are very opinionated and welcome the chance to share their views. It is therefore the responsibility of government, es-pecially in this current debate over preventative detention, to structure a real people’s consultation process where the broadest possible canvass of public opinion can be realized and governments will not be afraid to hear the true opinions of the masses. (Comments welcomed: [email protected])

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Growers Second Payment will not be late

In the last two editi ons of the local newspapers Dr. Canton’s private company, Belize Citrus Mutual and mysterious persons posing as a member of the CGA, have been casti ng aspersions that the CGA directors on the CPBL Board are refusing to sign off on the audited fi nancial statements for CPBL and its subsidiaries. One release goes

on to make many unfounded comments about the CGA.

The reality is that the audited fi nancials have yet to be approved by the Board for a number of reasons. First-ly, management without authorizati on by the Board chose to adopt a certain fi nancial reporti ng standard IFRS (Internati onal Financial Reporti ng Standards) for SMEs and then sought to convince the Board that the Board had given approval, despite the matt er never coming up for decision at the October 29th 2010 Board meeti ng.

At the end of the October 29th 2010 Board meeti ng a CGA director suggested that a date be set for a subse-quent Board meeti ng and the BHL directors were not agreeable to this. A CGA director, as per the arti cles of the Company, requested a Board meeti ng to be held in February 2011. The purpose of that meeti ng was to deal with the fi nancial business of the company including the approval of the audited fi nancial statements. However, that meeti ng was aborted when BHL appointed directors insisted that the CGA directors must acknowledge Henry Canton as the CEO of CPBL. The CGA appointed directors explained their positi on that since CPBL at its December 17th 2010 extraordinary general meeti ng terminated Henry Canton’s employ-ment with immediate eff ect, while they will not object to Henry Canton being at the meeti ng, they for the record could not acknowledge him as the CEO.

The CGA directors tried in every way to accommodate its BHL counterparts by agreeing to have Henry Canton att end the meeti ng aft er being told by the Managing Director of BHL that the CFO and executi ve secretary of the company had indicated that they would not att end the Board meeti ng if Dr. Canton was not allowed to att end – imagine that! BHL directors decided to walk out of the February meeti ng knowing full well that material decisions needed to be made.

At present CPBL is in the process of having its auditors address certain matt ers in the fi nancial statements to ensure accurate disclosure and presentati on of the fi nancial statements. This is necessary because although the management decided to adopt a certain fi nancial reporti ng standard the standard is being selecti vely ap-plied in certain areas. In terms of presentati on management took the decision to stop presenti ng the fi nan-cials which shows both the parent only form and consolidated form. With these issues properly addressed the fi nancials will be approved in ti me for growers to get their second payment in ti me.

This enti re scenario could have been avoided if management had not acted unilaterally or perhaps in collu-sion with directors representi ng BHL and sought the approval of the Board with this matt er early on. Where else does the management controls the audit functi on of a company outside the purview of the Board or relies on the interest of minority shareholder?

With respect to the CGA and its operati ons, like the last Committ ee of Management, the current Committ ee of Management has been working to address the damage done to the CGA by those same individuals who own the Belize Citrus Mutual during their tenure as Chairmen of the CGA. It was these same challenges that caused the CGA to change its directors on the CPBL Board when the Board signaled that it was budgeti ng to lose some $10m dollars.

Regarding the reporti ng to growers at the last AGM, growers received the full fi nancials of the CGA and its subsidiaries. The current audit will be completed aft er the CPBL fi nancials are approved and will be distrib-uted to all members in ti me for the Annual General Meeti ng.

Dr. Henry Canton and his colleagues at the Belize Citrus Mutual should explain to all growers and the coun-try of Belize how is it they are preventi ng the perti nent authoriti es from sancti oning the recommendati ons made by the Government-appointed Nati onal HLB Taskforce from January 2010. HLB is aff ecti ng the industry while you conti nue to scheme to destroy the CGA in an eff ort to get control of the 51% majority sharehold-ing in CPBL. Explain to growers how your members are taking CGA to court because they want to att end and vote at CGA meeti ngs but do not want to pay the membership fees.

In closing the CGA reiterates that its directors on the CPBL Board must properly carry out their fi duciary re-sponsibility to ensure that the audited fi nancial statements of the company and its subsidiaries accurately refl ect the true fi nancial positi on of the company. The second payment of growers should not be aff ected.


Mexico reporter, his son and wife shot to death

VERACRUZ, Mexico (AP) — A jour-nalist, his wife, and their 21-year-old son were shot to death inside their home in this Gulf coast city Monday, authorities said.Journalist Miguel Angel Lopez Velasco and his family were shot with a 9 mm handgun, said Veracruz state prosecu-tor Jorge Yunis.Lopez Velasco wrote a column about politics and crime and was editorial di-rector for the daily newspaper Notiver. His son had been working as a photog-

rapher for the same news-paper.Yunis said investigators haven’t determined a mo-tive in the killings and no one has been arrested.Earlier this month, state police in Veracruz found the body of reporter Noel Lopez in a clandestine grave. He had been miss-ing since March. The two reporters are not related.Police said Noel Lopez died of a blow to the head and that soldiers found his

body after a man they arrested in the killings of several police offi cers con-fessed to killing him and led them to the body.Noel Lopez worked for the weeklies Horizonte and Noticias de Acayucan and for the daily newspaper La Verdad.Press freedom groups say Mexico is the most dangerous country in the Ameri-cas for journalists. More than 60 report-ers have been killed in Mexico since 2000, according to the National Human Rights Commission.

Guatemala arrests ex-general in 1980s killings

GUATEMALA CITY (AP) — Guate-malan police on Friday arrested a for-mer military chief of staff in the mass killing of government opponents dur-ing the country’s 36-year civil war, the highest-ranking offi cial yet detained for massacres in the 1980s.Retired Gen. Hector Mario Lopez, 81, was allegedly involved in about 200 massacres committed while he was chief of staff of the Guatemalan mili-tary between 1982 and 1983, said pros-ecutor Mynor Melgar. He faces charges of genocide and forced disappearance, a category of crime in which the victim has never been found.The civil war that started in 1960 cost about 200,000 lives before the govern-ment signed peace accords with leftist

rebels in 1996. Inde-pendent reports blame the armed forces for most of the deaths.Lopez was arrested in Guatemala City. He is accused of directing a “scorched earth” cam-paign against mainly Mayan communities during the dictatorship of Gen. Efrain Rios Montt.Rights activist Mario Minera welcomed the arrest of Lopez.

“This opens the possibility that there could be justice for hundreds of fami-lies, there could be a historical account-ing to explain why the general populace and the Mayan Indians were victims,” Minera said.Rios Montt told a local radio station that he would be willing to face justice as well for the events of the early 1980s. However, Montt enjoys immunity from prosecution because he is currently serving a term as a congressman.“It was a time of war, of guerrilla wars,” Montt told the Emisoras Unidas station. “If there is no justice, there can be no talk of peace.”It was not possible to reach Lopez for comment and it was unclear if he had a lawyer.

Cooperation, but no US money pledges, at Central American

anti-drug conference

GUATEMALA CITY — U.S. Secre-tary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and offi cials from throughout Central America are pledging to confront a problem her offi cials acknowledge U.S. policies helped create: a rise in activity by powerful drug cartels in the vulner-able nations of the region.Representatives at the two-day meeting that opens Wednesday in Guatemala City are expected to discuss a coordinated se-curity plan to stem the growing presence of cartels in Central America and ask for close to $1 billion to pay for it.But U.S. offi cials said Monday that par-ticipants should not expect Clinton to break out the checkbook.“The secretary may announce how we’re repackaging some of our own assistance. But ... this is not a donors conference,” Assistant Secretary for Western Hemi-sphere Affairs Arturo Valenzuela told reporters in Washington on Monday.Instead, Valenzuela said, “we’re taking substantial amounts of support for Cen-tral America and try to convert it into a far more strategic strategy.”Years of U.S.-backed anti-drug crack-downs in Mexico and Colombia have pushed traffi ckers into the Central American countries wedged between them, spreading violence in a region where corruption, poverty and under-funded police forces have allowed the problem to grow almost unchecked.The harsh reality facing Guatemala was highlighted last month when 27 people were massacred, most beheaded, on a ranch in the country in an attack blamed on Mexico’s brutal Zetas drug cartel, which has set up shop in Guatemala.In a March visit to El Salvador, Presi-dent Barack Obama announced a secu-rity partnership intended to address both Central America’s growing problem and the wider drug, gangs and guns problem that spills south from North America.The United States is the world’s largest consumer of illegal drugs. It is also by far the world’s largest supplier of arms, according to the Stockholm Internation-al Peace Research Institute.But Obama’s announcement did not come with new money, just a pledge to review about $200 million already allo-cated.

Central America has long been a transit corridor for drugs moving from Colom-bia to the United States. But as the U.S. has cracked down on security and Mex-ico’s war on drugs has grown bloodier, crime syndicates have increasingly made Central America their home. And they have found fertile ground. Borders have minimal migration control, and local gangs provide a ready-made infrastruc-ture for organized crime.In Mexico City on Tuesday, El Salvador President Mauricio Funes said members of the Zetas drug cartel have gone on scouting missions to his country to ob-tain weapons left over from its 12-year civil war.Such insecurity is a major concern for neighbors including Mexico, where, ac-cording to offi cial fi gures, at least 35,000 have been killed in drug violence since late 2006, when President Felipe Calde-ron launched his crackdown on organ-ized crime. Mexican news media report the number is as high as 40,000.Calderon is expected to be one of 10 presidents or prime ministers in attend-ance at the conference.“Helping Central America confront or-ganized crime is a matter of global re-sponsibility,” Ruben Beltran, the Mexi-can Foreign Ministry’s undersecretary for Latin America and the Caribbean, told The Associated Press by email.He praised the cooperation of the United States, Colombia, European Union and other partners in the conference, saying that the new coordination will be “con-centrated fundamentally in strengthening institutions of security and justice.”U.S. offi cials acknowledge that the bil-lions spent fi ghting drug cartels through Plan Colombia and the Merida Initiative in Mexico have left a vacuum in the mid-dle that the cartels have fi lled.“The logic is those who are affected by those efforts have focused their effort, their attention, and their resources in Central America,” Assistant Secretary for International Narcotics and Law En-forcement William Brownfi eld, who will also travel to Guatemala, told reporters Monday.He said the United States would work with countries in the region, but also push them to pay for security programs

themselves: “to increase additional re-sources internally, strengthen their budg-ets and that kind of thing, and work much more effectively in developing the secu-rity strategy.”But Valenzuela acknowledged at a brief-ing ahead of the conference that many countries in the region do not collect enough taxes to invest in security.

El Salvador’s private sector has come out against a new tax proposed last month by President Mauricio Funes to raise $380 million over three years to pay for secu-rity programs.Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla is waiting on legislative approval for pro-jects to raise an additional $100 million to fi ght organized crime.


Fresh Libya civilian deaths pile pressure on NATO

SURMAN, Libya- The Libyan govern-ment said on Monday 19 civilians were killed in a NATO air strike on the home of one of Muammar Gaddafi’s top offi-cials, a day after NATO admitted killing civilians in a separate aerial attack.Libyan officials took reporters to Sur-man, 70 km (45 miles) west of Tripoli, to the site of what they said was a NATO air strike on the home of Khouildi Ha-midi, a member of Libya’s 12-strong Revolutionary Command Council, led by Gaddafi.Rescue teams were looking for survi-vors while reporters visited the site. Re-porters were then taken to a hospital in nearby Sabrata where they were shown nine bodies, including those of two children, plus some body parts, which the Libyan government said were all of people killed in the attack.The state-run Jana news agency later reported on its website that eight chil-dren were among 19 people killed in the attack. The dead included members of Hamidi’s family, it said. The govern-ment said Hamidi himself was not hurt.NATO said it had bombed a “legiti-mate military target -- a command and control node” in the area, and it could not confirm whether civilians had been hurt. It said NATO does not target spe-cific individuals.“This strike will greatly degrade the Gaddafi regime forces’ ability to carry on their barbaric assault against the Libyan people,” Lieutenant-General Charles Bouchard, the Canadian com-mander of NATO’s Libya operation, said in a statement.If the Libyan government’s account of civilian deaths is confirmed, the inci-

dent could further complicate opera-tions of the NATO-led military alliance, starting to feel the strain of a campaign that is taking longer and costing more than planned.NATO acknowledged on Sunday for the first time that it had killed multiple ci-vilians in Libya, when a strike intended to hit a missile site erred and destroyed a house in Tripoli. Bouchard said he re-gretted the loss of life in that incident, and a system failure may have knocked the weapon off course.Libyan officials say NATO forces have killed more than 700 civilians, although they have not presented evidence of such large numbers of civilian deaths and NATO denies them. Libya says one of Gaddafi’s sons and three of his grandchildren were killed six weeks ago when Gaddafi’s Tripoli compound was hit.Italy’s Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said on Monday civilian deaths pose a risk to the NATO-led military alliance. NATO states have been hitting targets in Libya since March 19 in what they say is an operation to protect civilians.“NATO is endangering its credibility; we cannot risk killing civilians,” Frat-tini told reporters before an EU foreign ministers’ meeting in Luxembourg to discuss ways to aid rebels.The Arab League, which in March asked the United Nations Security Council to impose a no-fly zone over Libya to protect civilians, condemned the loss of life in Sunday’s incident.The Libyan leader says the Western-led military campaign is an act of colonial aggression designed to steal Libya’s oil.

Syria warns against out-side interference

Syria strongly rejected on Tuesday any foreign intervention over its deadly crackdown on a pro-democracy revolt and singled out former colonial master France, which is pressing the UN Secu-rity Council to act.“We can reach consensus despite oppos-ing points of view,” Foreign Minister Walid Muallem told a Damascus news conference. “No one outside (Syria) can impose on us their point of view.”And while not directly accusing neigh-bouring Turkey of meddling, Muallem hinted that Ankara, which has called for democratic reforms in Syria and welcomed thousands of people fleeing violence in Syria, should “reconsider its position.”“We say to those in Europe who are criti-cising us that they should stop interfer-ing in Syrian affairs and sowing trouble in order to apply plans contrary to Syrian national interests.”Muallem accused France of pursuing a “colonialist agenda under the guise of human rights” and said French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe had colonial “illu-sions.”France, which ruled Syria for several years under a League of Nations mandate after World War I, is spearheading at-tempts to get the United Nations to speak out against Damascus’s crackdown.More than 1,300 civilians have been killed and some 10,000 people arrested, according to Syrian rights groups, in the crackdown that has seen troops dis-patched to crush revolt in cities across the country.“Mr Juppe is still living under the illu-sions of the French colonial era. He has no influence in Syrian affairs,” the for-eign minister said, adding that Juppe im-agined he had the right to “confer legiti-macy on this or that leader.”Western governments have been circu-lating a draft Security Council resolu-tion condemning Assad’s crackdown but Russia has warned it would veto such a move.On Monday, Juppe said in Luxembourg that Assad had reached “a point of no re-turn.”“Some believe there’s still time for him

to change his ways and commit to a (re-form) process,” he said. “For my part, I doubt it. I think that the point of no return has been reached.”Muallem also likened to “war” EU sanc-tions over the crackdown.European ministers on Monday agreed to beef up sanctions on Assad as they cast doubt on his latest offers of change, some demanding he “reform or step aside.”European Union foreign ministers also angrily demanded action at the United Nations and slammed Russia’s resistance to any such move.Turning to Turkey, which has repeat-edly criticised repression by the Assad regime, Muallem said, “We are keen on maintaining good relations with Turkey with which we share a common border of 850 kilometres (528 miles).”“We don’t want to wipe away years of ef-forts to establish privileged ties,” he add-ed. “I wish (Turkey) would reconsider its position.”His comments came as Turkey distanced itself from Syria over its brutal crack-down on the revolt, which has threatened the authoritarian rule of President Bashar al-Assad.Turkish President Abdullah Gul said on Monday that Assad should have been more “clear-cut” in promises of reform that he made in a speech the same day.“One must read between the lines in his speech. He should say loud and strong in a clear-cut manner: ... ‘We are passing to a pluralist system, we will organise dem-ocratic elections that conform to interna-tional standards,’” Anatolia news agency quoted Gul as saying.“As soon as the Syrian president says that he will lead the transition in his country, we will see that things will change,” Gul added.On Tuesday, Assad proclaimed a new general amnesty, a day after offering a “national dialogue” to end the deadly unrest and as a huge crowd rallied in Da-mascus in his support.However, pro-democracy activists have rejected his overtures and vowed that the “revolution” would carry on, while the US State Department called for “action, not words.”

Five people were killed in anti-govern-ment protests on Tuesday in the central city of Homs and in the northeastern province of Deir Ezzor, activists said.In Damascus, meanwhile, security forc-es raided the university campus during a demonstration, beating students will truncheons and arresting more than 100 of them, activists said.One student was said to have been seri-ously injured and int hospital.On Wednesday, Muallem repeated As-sad’s call for dialogue.“I say to those Syrians demanding

change, come participate in the national dialogue and test the seriousness and will of the Syrian leadership.”At the same time, he told them not to “in-cite demonstrations and violence, which is useless and which only serves the en-emies of Syria.”Muallem also denied Western allega-tions that Syria had received any assis-tance from ally Iran or Lebanon’s mili-tant group Hezbollah in putting down the protests.Explore Related Content1 - 4 of 12


Extrapolati ng the expropriati ons by extension

Continues from page 4 It is amazing that Dean Barrow et al are no longer concerned about our in-debtedness as a country. Weren’t these the archetypical Cassandra’s, Chicken Little’s, wolf criers and prophets of economic doom just 4 years ago? Did somebody have a “Road to Damascus” moment and decided they no longer needed to kick those bricks? Every international credit ratings agency is going to send us further below the Mendoza line of credibility because of this. How come there is no cry that the sky is falling because we are being downgraded for being too indebted? Am I the only one thinking that perhaps it is a sign that the bottom is falling out with this unprecedented run of bankruptcies but Barrow and his Cabinet cohorts are happily oblivious? The most salient point for me is that there is nothing in all this that per-suades me that this was the something that “had” to be done. And even more importantly, this is not out of some thought out or thought through public policy arrived at after national consultation and debate. If we are to go by the smell test, it stinks to high heaven of being a con-spiracy though, meaning that there is some premeditation at work. A “quitar” policy was elucidated by Dean Barrow before the last general elections, and we have seen the evidence of its implementation. Again, it is only my opin-ion, but I believe it is his opposition via his judgments to that policy that cost the esteemed former Chief Justice Dr. Abdulai Conteh his post, and Belize his distinguished services. It is no stretch to extrapolate that the expropriations of BTL and BEL are an extension of that policy.

Coroner’s Inquest into the death of Offi cer Gavin Sanchez...A disappointing conclusion

By Rhenae NunezWednesday, June 22, 2011Belize City – Offi cer Gavin Sanchez was taken out in a hail of gunfi re inside the barracks of the San Pedro police precinct in March of 2010. As much as sixteen bullets were said to have emp-tied into his body. That fi gure has now been curtailed to eight bullets. The of-fi cer who perpetrated the heinous act was Sergeant Paulino Reyes of the San Pedro police formation. Today a just concluded Coroner’s In-quest before Magistrate Roberto Or-donez decided that the act was one of self defense. A jury of three women and two men concluded in half an hour to decide that it was self-defense. The in-quest commenced in late March of this year. No doubt this will spark similar protestations as it did following the in-cident last year. Police account at the same said that around 11:45 pm Sgt. Paulino Reyes happened upon an altercation between offi cer Sanchez and two BDF sol-diers and another police offi cer at Wet Willy’s Club on San Pedro. Offi cer Sanchez and a BDF and police offi cer Jeffery Martinez escorted Sanchez out of the establishment and taken to the San Pedro police station around mid-

night. According to police Sanchez was acting disorderly and uttered threats that he would that boy (no clarifi cation who Sanchez allegedly referred to).Sgt Reyes returned to the police station around 2:30 a.m. He made entries into the diary regarding the encounter with offi cer Sanchez at Wet Willy’s. He in-cluded information to him that Sanchez allegedly said that he would be waiting for him behind the station.Reyes and two BDF soldiers went to the back where Sanchez was and shortly af-ter police say that shots were heard. Assistant Commissioner of Police Magdaleno said that nine expended 9mm shells, six slugs, one 9mm Ruger brand pistol and magazine with two live 9mm rounds and .45 Springfi eld pistol with fi ve .45 live rounds, a magazine, one piece aluminum pipe about two feet long, a bullet proof vest (found on the body) and blood stained tennis shoes were recovered from the scene. Sanchez’s wife was not told of her hus-band’s cruel demise until much later that day suggesting some kind of cover up. The killing sparked public criticism particularly the snail’s pace at which the investigation was being handled and the appearance that the Belize Police De-partment was doing all it can to shield Sgt. Reyes from prosecution. So far there is no word whether the family will pursue the matter any fur-ther. Last that offi cer Sanchez’s wife appeared in the media she reported that she was pregnant and that her husband died not knowing that there would have been another addition to their family. Andrea Faith Sanchez was born just hours before Hurricane Richard struck. She arrived one month prior to due and spent a week in the hospital. She is said to be doing fi ne today.

Quarelling about Words

Who is next on Barrow’s hit list?

Carey, who was brought back after be-ing exiled a year and a half earlier, in a special session on January 25th and 26th of this year. Observers have won-dered and speculated at the long delay in delivering judgment, and we note, for the record, that just last week it was announced that Justice Carey was given another temporary contract to serve on the panel. Some observers, though, speculate

that Barrow may attempt next his takeo-ver targeting the Port of Belize, which has started to experience some labor turbulence. There are also reports that two busi-nesses are near bankruptcy and are fac-ing imminent receivership. One is a medical facility, and the other is a con-dominium/resort development. Both are believed to be near being put into receivership by the Belize Bank.

Press Release

Dr. and Mrs. Lizarraga are proud to an-nounce the graduation of their son Ian Malcolm Lizarraga from Northwestern University in Evanston IL., June 17th,

2011. He was awarded aBachelors’ De-gree, majoring in Physics and Math-ematics with the honors of Magna Cum Laude. Ian also received departmental honors for his research in theoretical astrophysics and was also inducted into the highly selective honors society of Phi Beta Kappa in which onlythe top 5% of honors graduates are inducted.Among other accomplishments such as recipient of the PSA honors , top CXC honors , and the open scholarship of Belize, Ian continues to make Belize proud. He was also awarded a pres-tigious graduate fellowship to pursue a PhD in applied mathematics at Cor-nell University starting August 2011. Only one in fi ve postgrad applicants is awarded such fellowships.Ian gratefully acknowledges the sup-port and assistance of all his previous teachers, his family and his past alma maters, in particular he acknowledges the support he has received from the government of Belize and the ministry of Education in facilitating funding for his open scholarship.

Belize’s Musical Ambassador

Musical Scam Artist of the year

Shyne Barrow

STOP

SCAMS

SHYNE BARROW

A PAID AD

www.nationalperspectivebz.orgwww.nationalperspectivebz.orgwww.nationalperspectivebz.org

Continued from page 1


The Barrow administration/PUC vs BEL/Fortis sagaPart 2 - By: Rhenae NunezJust this week the Barrow adminis-tration convened a special meeting of the National Assembly and ex-propriated the majority shareholding in Belize Electricity Limited from Fortis Inc. The parties were in open disagreement on how the business of the distribution of electricity to the nation should be conducted, and that sharp disagreement surfaced barely six weeks after the UDP had won the 2008 General Elections.To help our readers better understand this complex issue and have an in-formed opinion the following is the second part of the chronology of the interaction between the parties, the Barrow administration/PUC on the one hand, and BEL/Fortis on the oth-er. The fi rst part that was published in last weekend’s edition of the news-paper was from March 2008 to May 2009. This second part is from May 2009 to this week.� e excerpts are courtesy of Chan-nel 7 News’ archives and we repro-duce them with permission and our thanks.June 15, 2009: BEL reported a loss in earnings of $10.8 million. Returns to shareholders declined from 11.9% in 2007 to negative 4.3% in 2008. PUC imposed $36.2 million rebate. PUC says that BEL’s loss is because of faulty accounting, BEL should instead be showing a pro� t in the region of $26 million. � e second largest investor in BEL, the Social Security Board makes it known to BEL that it would challenge its accounting treatment since SSB’s loss is estimated at $2.9 million. SSB owns 27% of BEL.June 17, 2009: Court of Appeals dis-misses BEL’s appeal of amendments to byelaws made by utilities minister Melvin Hulse. � e amendment was made by statutory instrument. BEL contended that it was done without consultation with them therefore that made the amendment illegal.November 24, 2009: BEL challenges the impartiality of Justice Denys Bar-row. BEL asks the court to set aside a judgment in which Barrow was a part of the panel of judges. BEL lost a decision to PUC in the Supreme Court and the subsequent appeal in the Court of Appeal on October 27th – that was the panel that included Justice Barrow. BEL’s application stated: “... (the cir-cumstances) give rise to a reasonable apprehension or suspicion on the part of a fair minded and informed member of the public that (Justice) Barrow lacked impartiality.”

The application prepared by Musa and Balderamos stated that Justice Barrow is listed on the Barrow and

Company website as a member of that law fi rm. BEL’s attorney Antho-ny Sylvester pointed out that Barrow and Company still had an ongoing client relationship with the PUC on which Justice Barrow’s son, Kimano Barrow is a Commissioner of the board of the PUC. Kimano Barrow was appointed by PM Dean Barrow who is brother to Justice Barrow. Another assertion made by BEL’s business manager, Rene Blanco is that Justice Barrow “appeared ex-tremely opposed” to BEL’s position. Blanco sat in on the appeal in the Court of Appeal.Another assertion made by BEL’s business manager, Rene Blanco is that Justice Barrow “appeared ex-tremely opposed” to BEL’s position. Blanco sat in on the appeal in the Court of Appeal.November 25, 2009: PM Barrow de-fends his brother saying that the ap-peal by BEL will go nowhere.PM Barrow stated: “He sits as one of three and I think there are clear rules in terms of codes of conduct that would govern judges and those that deal with things like a judge not sitting if a close family member is appearing. For example he would not be able to sit if Leisje, Chung, or Naima Badillo Barrow is appearing. I don’t think he would be able to sit if Deanne Barrow, my daughter, his niece, is appearing, things like that and he is a fi rst rate lawyer and a fi rst rate jurist and I am absolute-ly sure that if there were even the slightest chance that his sitting in that case might come close to violat-ing any rule he would not have sat so I think that’s nonsense.”December 15, 2009: Japan gives Be-lize $10 million for Solar Energy Pro-ject. The project should have started in mid 2010 and should be completed in August 2011.

February 4, 2010: PUC charges BEL criminally for not submitting a Full Tariff Review Proceeding (FTRP). According to PUC Chairman John Avery, the PUC had written to BEL several times. Having gotten no re-sults the PUC fi led charges within the legal 12 month period.The penalty for the charge is $5000.00 or fi ve months in prison. According to Chairman Avery, BEL was delib-erately trying to frustrate the PUC. Avery also said that by then PUC owed consumers $35 million.March 5, 2010: BEL versus Justice Denys Barrow goes to court. BEL CEO Lyn Young: “We took is-sue with the fact that Justice Bar-row sat on the Court of Appeal and we are not alleging that he is biased but we just felt that there was an ap-pearance, we didn’t feel good about it and we questioned it and our law-yers felt that he shouldn’t have sat on the case being that his son is a commissioner and all that. So there are a lot of legal arguments. Again

like I said we are not alleging any bias on the part of Justice Barrow but certainly from where we sat it didn’t look good.”The matter was heard by President Elliott Mottley, Justices Boyd Carey and Manuel Sosa.March 10, 2010: BEL versus Justice Denys Barrow underway. Counsel for PUC Derek Courtney submitted that it was not enough for BEL to estab-lish that PUC Commissioner Kimano Barrow is the son of Justice Barrow.Why did BEL go to such lengths? CEO Lyn Young said, “I think it is a very important matter. The is-sue is whether or not the PUC has the authority to tell BEL who to do contracts with and also to dictate the conditions of contracts and I’ve worked with BEL when we were run by the government, when we had that kind of thing happening from Ministers of Government and I think everybody in Belize knows the corruption that comes about when people with such wide powers abuse it. So we feel the better situation, and what we’ve seen in other jurisdic-tions, is that the PUC acts more as an adjudicator where if BEL does a contract with someone, the PUC re-views the contract and the PUC can say no we don’t approve this or they can decide that if you go ahead with that contract, you will bear the cost of it and we won’t allow that you to pass it on in rates. When the PUC takes that role then there are checks and balances in the system.”March 19, 2010: Court of Appeal fi nds appearance of bias on part of Justice Denys Barrow. Lyn Young comments: “We are happy that we have another chance to make our case because as we’ve said before, we feel that it is a very important case for the company. The issue of course is that the PUC has been try-ing to force us to get into contracts that we think are not good for us, that are not good for our customers. We are glad to get another opportu-nity to try to get that straighten out.”Because of sensitive nature of the matter which marked a pivotal mo-ment in Justice Barrow’s career, at-torneys were reluctant to comment until they had read the reasons for the decision. The very same day a fare-well ceremony was held for “retir-ing” Justice Boyd Carey who makes it clear that he was not leaving be-cause he wanted to.May 13, 2010: BEL holds AGM and reports $186 million as their 2009 earning with $8.9 million in profi t and 4.9% rate of return on net fi xed assets. PUC said that BEL owed con-sumers $40 million in excess earn-ings from unadjusted fuel prices. March 15, 2011: PUC wins in appeal of June 2008 Final Decision. BEL says it will further appeal the judg-ment. PUC Chairman John Avery: “In this case BEL didn’t think we were fair with them and they came to court basically asking the judge to tell us that we need to increase rates. His-tory has shown that the last two and a half years that the rates we did set at that time was more than enough for BEL and in fact BEL’s fi nancial position over the last two years has been better than any other time in its history.”PUC Attorney, Andrew Marshalleck: “BEL challenged the lawfulness of

the decision of the Public Utilities rate settings for the year 2008-2009 on a host of bases and none of them succeeded, so in short, the decision setting the rates for those years, for that year, stands and the challenges fall away. We, of course, expect a further appeal.”According to Chairman Avery the debt to consumers had grown to $50 million. “Approximately 50 mil-lion dollars by now, however those are based on those rates. The rates that we changed in 2009 and any rate that we deal with going forward most likely will reduce that amount. When we net off all of it, it won’t be 50 million dollars but BEL will still have collected more than would have been fair to consumers over the last two and a half years.”On the much debated about Mollejon Transmission Line, John Avery com-mented: ”That that line was contrib-uted capital and they shouldn’t have paid BECOL to basically re-pur-chase that line they already owned. BEL owns this asset, BEL signed an agreement with BECOL to basically re-purchase this asset. That 43 mil-lion that BEL paid for that line in our opinion was basically a givea-way. So as far as we were concerned that isn’t fair to consumers. Con-sumers cannot be burdened with that. However, like you mentioned - this is a matter for sharehold-ers, based on the judge’s judgment and our opinion, BEL paid 43 mil-lion dollars to BECOL for no good purpose and that is money that re-ally should have accrued to BEL to be re-invested in BEL, or should be shared amongst the shareholders.”May 4, 2011: BEL’s Annual Report shows $186 million in earning by the company – down from $190 million of the previous year. Net earnings dropped from $8.8 million to $3.4mil-lion. BEL raises the alarm about the cash fl ow problem. People of Belize will have to honor guarantee given by the Government of Belize.Following increase of Gross Tax from 1.75% to 6.50% BEL also com-plained that it could not pay it until they had collected from consumers but PM Barrow insists that govern-ment must collect its taxes. PM Bar-

row: “There is a letter of credit that we have guaranteed, their -- we were very concerned because BEL is al-most at the outer limits of that let-ter of credit. We are just concerned that there be a stable fl ow of energy. We are concerned that CFE, from where we get so much of our power, perhaps 50%, at times we are get-ting most of our power from them, that there should not be any cutting off of that source of power. So we’re concerned that BEL should pay CFE so as to forestall any interup-tion of power. Government is moni-toring the situation closely, we did


The Barrow administration/PUC vs BEL/Fortis sagawhat we could in terms of paying a little early what we owed to BEL in terms of our bills for street lighting and so on. But we have the situation very much under review, and if cir-cumstances warrant, then Govern-ment will have to intervene to ensure the non-interruption of that supply in Mexico.”PM Barrow on unpaid taxes BEL and acknowledged the cash flow prob-lem: ”Well I’ll check; we certainly increased the taxes. It is clear that BEL is having some cash-flow dif-ficulties; what is not so clear is why that should be. When you look at their annual report, and you see that they spent something like 43 mil-lion dollars in capital expenditure in 2009, and then 44 million dollars in capital expenditure last year, you kind of wonder how it is.”May 12, : “government has no dis-pute with CEL, BECOL or Fortis” and “its only interest is in maintain-ing an uninterrupted and reliable supply of electricity to consumers in the country, and it is prepared to take whatever reasonable steps are necessary to achieve this objec-tive.” 2011: BEL holds its Annual General Meeting. Cash flow contin-ues to be the cry from the company. BEL declared its inability to pay shareholders including Social Securi-ty Board which owns a[pproximately 26% of the shares in the company.The hard talk between BEL and the PUC continues with BEL’s CEO Lynn Young commented saying that, “... for the last three years it seems like the PUC has misconstrued its responsibility to balance the inter-est of the consumer and the Com-pany….the PUC…seems obsessed with destroying what we have built over the last thirty years.”June 8, 2011: PM Barrow holds a rau-cous quarterly “press meeting” at the Belize Biltmore Plaza and declares that BEL is “bruk”.PM Barrow: “What I gather is that basically, BEL is bankrupt. Now as I said, how it got there, and what hap-pened when BEL was making huge profits, is quite another story. But I saw in the newspaper that Mr. Lynn Young basically said, “Well, we don’t have any money to pay for en-ergy from CFE, the Mexicans who supply us with the bulk of our pow-er. We don’t even have any money to pay our sister company, BECOL, from which we get the hydropower. And so basically, power will be cut off, the country will be plunged into rolling, if not a continuous black outs, and Government better solve it.” Well, I’m not sure if the way - let me put it this way. Goverment will solve it. I’m not sure that there will joy on the part of BEL and its par-ent company, Fortis, in terms of how Government will solve the problem. But to that extent, Mr. Young is ab-solutely right. This government has a responsibility to its people, to the consumers, and Government will not allow a situation to occur in which this county is not guaranteed a sta-ble supply of electricity. The Gov-ernment is prepared to do whatever is necessary to assure a stable elec-tricity supply to this country. This government, the party that is now in government, was always ideologi-cally opposed to the privatization of essential resources. So, wherewithal apart, as a matter of philosophy and

what conviction and what we think is right, we believe that the people of this country should own BEL.”Channel 7 reports: “The Company’s hard and fast position is that under the current regulatory framework - it cannot continue to be viable - mean-ing basically that it wants a big raise in rates, which the PUC refuses to give. In fact the PUC says BEL actu-ally owes consumers!”Prime Minister Dean Barrow“Mr. Young then says, “But, the banks will be prepared to lend us if you, Mr. Government, can guaran-tee that the PUC will in effect, con-sent to an almost - my words, not his, and I am interpreting as best as I can - an almost unlimited rate in-crease. Now, ladies and gentlemen, if I ever did that I would need to have my head examined, or perhaps taken off by the Belizean people. First of all, we don’t tell the PUC what to do. The PUC is there as an honest broker between BEL and the consumers, and as I said, there is le-gal regulatory framework.”PM Barrow declared that public utilities should be in the hands of the people and announced the pos-sible or eminent takeover of BEL. CEO of BEL, Lynn Young was out of the country and the Prime Minis-ter promised a meeting with Young when he returned to the country. Bar-row pledges a prepayment of BEL’s bills.Prime Minister Dean Barrow“But if BEL can’t get money to pay for energy, then it seems to me that BEL is on the brink of becoming non-operational. And I am saying to you, ladies and gentlemen, that the Government of Belize cannot have that happen. I will try to report again to you as quickly after that meeting on Friday, as I can. They’re at the margins, so Mexico is threatening to cut us off again. Government is prepared to pre-pay another couple of months electricity bills, 4 million dollars, and that will buy us 12 days or so. And it is my promise to the

Belizean people, that within that 12 days, a solution will be found.”June 13, 2011: Lynn Young writes to Government of Belize offering to sell the company’s shares to government. GOB not comfortable with the terms described by BEL – GOB circles the assets of the company.PM Barrow: “Those who know better than I suggest that that’s not the end of it. I look at case recently where there was a forced takeover and in relation to the claim for com-pensation the court says this was a failed company - failing and failed company and you are not entitled to any compensation. So quite how you trade off the fact that there is an asset value against the fact that

the company virtually is insolvent - is bankrupt, I don’t know but ob-viously the idea is to get somebody to conduct that exercise fairly and for government then to bite the bul-let once it is satisfied that whatever price is come up with is in all the circumstances are justifiable price.”BEL’s 2010 report puts physical as-sets of property, plant and equipment at $444.6 million, the company’s eq-uity was listed at $286.7 million, and $69 million was listed as liability of debentures.Channel 7 reported that government would need an additional 24% of shares to gain control. Fortis had ear-lier said that they are NOT interested in minority shareholding. June 15, 2011: Government prepays $4 million to BEL for electricity from CFE, Mexico. Things intensify and tension between BEL and GOB is high. It was hoped that the pre-payment would buy some 21 days within which some agreement could be reached with BEL’s owner, Fortis. According to PM Barrow, Fortis had made an offer of $200 million for its equity in the company – with a take it or leave attitude. Fortis also tacked on an additional $36 million which has been in dispute since 2008 when the PUC disallowed it as BEL’s cost and what may have precipitated the saga that has brought us to where we are. A release from the Government of Belize indicates acknowledgement of the repercussions where foreign investment is concerned. The release states in part: “government has no dispute with CEL, BECOL or For-tis” and “its only interest is in main-taining an uninterrupted and relia-ble supply of electricity to consumers in the country, and it is prepared to take whatever reasonable steps are necessary to achieve this objective.”June 16, 2011:PM Barrow an-nounced that the Government of Belize is prepared to take over BEL “on an amicable basis, if that is at all possible.” PUC announces the can-cellation of BEL’s license because of failure to pay license fees for 2009 and 2010. BEL responds with same refrain that cash flow crisis has prevented them from paying their fee which is 0.5% of gross revenues which amounts to $1.88 million.According to reports, the PUC has

been cautioning BEL about its out-standing fees. The timing of the an-nouncement that the company’s license will be cancelled is no coin-cidence.June 17, 2011 – Friday: Government announces special meeting of the House of Representatives – BEL’s senior managers resign and terminat-ed. They are: Vice PR Vice President Engineering, Joseph Sooknandan, Vice President of Finance Rene Blanco, Vice President Customer Care, Curtis Eck and Company Sec-retary Juliet Estell.Speculation is wide that legislation

will be passed for the take-over of BEL as was done when government took BTL in August of 2009.June 20, 2011 – Monday: BEL rena-tionalized/expropriated. PM Barrow seeks a new CEO for BEL after for-mer CEO Lyn Young resigned on Fri-day June 17th. Jeffery Locke’s name is floated as new BEL CEO – PM

Barrow resists confirming that to the media. He pushes to dot all “i’s” and cross all “t’s”. PM Barrow: ”I don’t know that I want to confirm anything just at the moment. The Senate has to meet this afternoon and the GG has to sign the bill into law. He is as I un-derstand it in Belize City today and there is some doubt as to whether he will be available after 4. If the Sen-ate doesn’t get through by 4 his sig-nature will not be until tomorrow. It is not until he signs that the relevant orders can proceed to be made and so we’ll be getting a little ahead of ourselves I think if we confirm any name in terms of what we have in mind for the CEO position.” How soon will the takeover be ef-fected?PM Barrow: “If the orders can be sign tomorrow afternoon - as soon as the orders are sign. The Chair-man of the Board who is Rodwell Williams and has been the chairman from the time of the change of gov-ernment is standing by with the pro-spective interim CEO. I have to go tomorrow because the meeting with President Calderon has been con-firm for Wednesday in Guatemala City and so I will be leaving because I really need to talk to the President about this whole issue and how CFE can help. The Deputy Prime Minis-ter will then be acting Prime Min-ister. If we can get the orders made tomorrow afternoon, we would ex-pect that the chairman of the board together with the acting Prime Min-ister and the interim CEO would im-mediately go into the company both from the point of view of effecting as quickly as possible the implementa-tion of the takeover but also to reas-sure staff - to make it quite clear that as I said nobody is being force out, nobody is being ask to leave, nobody is being required to leave. We have heard that executive management which consists of about 4 persons or so, we know that FORTIS had made offers to them. They are likely to go but it is not as our prompting, it is not at our urging and so the idea of people going in as quickly as possi-ble - the chairman of the board, the interim CEO and the acting Prime Minister is to reassure the people there and to try and indicate and confirm and effect as orderly and as smooth and as quick a transition as possible.” Continues on page 15


HEAlTHY LIVINGDepression

Depression is an illness that causes a person to feel sad and hopeless for much of the time. It is different from normal feelings of sadness, grief, or low energy.People who are depressed may also: Lose interest in things they have enjoyed in the past. Think and speak more slowly than normal. Have trouble concentrating, re-membering, and making decisions. Have changes in their eating and sleeping habits. Be preoccupied with death and/or suicide. Have feelings of guilt, worthless-ness, or hopelessness.Depression affects men and women of all ages and has often been shown to run in families. A person can have one or many episodes of depression in a lifetime. Each episode of depres-sion makes a person more likely to have another episode of depression.Most people who are depressed get better with medicine, counseling, or a combination of the two. Some peo-ple with depression may need to be hospitalized.

What is depression in older adults?Depression is an illness that causes you to feel sad and hopeless much of the time. It is different from normal feelings of sadness, grief, or low en-ergy.Some people think that depression is normal with age. But it’s not. Older adults may go through major life changes or challenges that trig-ger depression. Such things as los-ing a spouse, living with a long-term health problem, or leaving a home you’ve lived in for many years are more common among older adults than others.Like others who experience a life change, older adults may feel sad and may grieve and recover, or they may develop depression.Some older adults are more likely to be depressed than others. Those who are more likely include: Older women. Those who are not married or who have lost their partners. Those who don’t have friends or family who can support them. Those who have had a medical prob-lem such as a heart attack, stroke, or broken hip or who have chronic pain. Those who drink too much alcohol.Why is depression a concern in older

adults?In older adults, untreated depres-sion can last for years. It can lead to or make worse other problems in physical and mental health and in re-lationships with others. It also makes suicide more likely. Older Americans have the highest suicide rate of any age group, and depression is often linked to the suicide. Older men have the highest rate of suicide of any group.Treatment can help depression and help you enjoy your life more. It also makes suicide less likely and may help older adults deal better with long-term health problems.Do older adults have different symp-toms than others who have depres-sion?Common symptoms of depression, such as sadness and loss of interest, occur in older adults just as they do in younger adults. But older adults also may: Feel confused or forgetful. Stop seeing friends and doing things. Have a hard time sleeping. Not feel like eating.How is depression diagnosed?Depression often is missed in older adults. People may think that sadness or depression is part of aging, so they don’t take it seriously. The symptoms of depression in older adults are sometimes like symptoms of other diseases, so de-pression may not be recognized. For example, a family member or doctor could mistake forgetting things as a symptom of dementia rather than de-pression. But people can have both. Many older adults take many med-icines, and certain medicines may cause depression. Older adults may not seek help for depression because they sometimes consider it a character fl aw or weak-ness. They may blame themselves for the problem or be too embarrassed to seek help. They may not admit to feeling sad.

The cost of doctor visits and treat-ment can prevent older adults from seeking help for depression.If your doctor thinks you are de-pressed, he or she will ask you ques-tions about your health and feelings. This is called a mental health assess-ment. Your doctor also may: Do a physical exam. Do tests to make certain your de-pression is not caused by another medical problem, such as a stroke, dementia, an underactive thyroid (hypothyroidism), or vitamin B12 defi ciency anemia. Ask you about suicide.If you think you have depression, read this information or take this short quiz Click here to see an inter-active tool. to check your symptoms.How is depression treated in older adults?As in younger adults, depression in older adults is treated with medicine, counseling, therapy, or a combina-tion. Treatment usually works, and treatment for depression also may help other medical problems that older adults have. Older adults may benefi t from early, continuing, and long-term treatment.Older adults may have special con-cerns when using medicine. Some of the medicines used for depression may not be good choices because they may interact with medi-cine being taken for other health problems. The side effects of medicines may be more severe. Some antidepressants may take longer to start working in older adults than they do in younger adults. Older adults may need medicine for a longer amount of time than younger adults.Many older adults don’t take all the medicines they need for depression. A caregiver or family member may need to help the person remember to take the medicines.Depression often occurs with demen-tia, which is a loss of mental skills

HEAlTHY LIVINGHEAlTHY LIVINGDepression

HEAlTHY LIVINGDepression that affects daily life. Medicines for

depression may help older adults with dementia, but there is little re-search to show how well they work in people with dementia.1What can an older adult do about de-pression?Older adults can be aware of how they are changing as they age and keep a healthy attitude. Remember that getting older is a natural part of life. If you take good care of your body and learn positive ways to deal with stress, you can slow down or even prevent problems that often come with getting older.One of the best things you can do for your health and to prevent depres-sion is to be active. Several studies suggest that walking with others and doing other forms of exercise reduce symptoms in older adults.2 It may help prevent depression and help pre-vent it from coming back (relapse).3, 4Your mental and emotional health also are important. Stay in touch with friends, family, and the community. If you remain close to others, you are more likely to feel better. Protect or improve your memory and mental sharpness by keeping your brain ac-tive through learning, doing cross-word puzzles, or playing cards or strategy games.Many people look back at their lives as they get older. You may feel you have lived a meaningful and good life. On the other hand, you may struggle with this and wonder if you made the most out of your life.If you are not happy about how you’ve lived your life, think about talking to a friend, doctor, or counse-lor about it. Warning Signs of Suicide in AdultsThe following warning signs may be present in adults who have a high risk for suicide: Depression or other mental health condition, such as severe anxiety, bi-polar disorder (manic-depressive ill-ness), or schizophrenia Depression followed by sudden cheerfulness and contentment, which may mean the person has made a de-cision to fi nalize a suicide plan A previous suicide attempt Alcohol or substance abuse Preoccupation with death in con-versations Giving away personal possessionsFactors that may increase the risk of suicide include having: A family member who has commit-ted suicide. A family history of depression, bi-polar disorder, or schizophrenia. A history of physical or sexual abuse. Diagnosis of a serious medical ill-ness. Failing relationships. A divorce. A recent life change, such as a death of a spouse or other member of the family, marriage, break-up of a marriage, the birth of a child, a job loss, a job promotion or demotion, or legal problems.


The Barrow administration/PUC vs BEL/Fortis sagaContinue from page 13PM Barrow on compensation to Fortis:“Compensation, again I am no expert but BTL would imagine the compensa-tion there would have to be far more than in this case. BTL was and remains a profitable company - there is no ques-tion at all of that and so we will have to when we pay compensation - compen-sate on that basis. With BEL it’s clearly a different story. Stan Marshall said he would sell for the book value. There is clearly a difference between book value and marker value and compensation is based on market value. Now market value takes into account not just the long term liabilities but the fact that currently operationally the company is pretty much in collapse. I don’t know the assets clearly have some financial worth but if the company was employing the assets in a loss making venture and you can’t sell the assets to anybody else because the assets are only good for the transmission of electricity. I would think that the end of the day the compensation would not be merely as much as some people especially in the private sector seem to fair.”By day’s end the Governor General has signed the bill into law and order of acquisition was signed by Minister of Utilities Elvin Penner and Min-ister of Finance Dean Barrow. New members of the Board of Directors scheduled to go in on Tuesday morn-ing. Chairman of the Board Rodwell Williams will address the new board.Speculation is that termination rather than resignations of the senior man-agers would afford them more ben-efits.With takeover a done deal – Opposi-tion People’s United Party boycotts special House meeting citing late notice. They suffer backlash from the electorate who say that the issue is too crucial for the PUP to be bow-ing out at the moment. So far, no statement has been made regarding the takeover.PM Barrow – special meeting of the House of Representatives on Monday June 20, 2011“Mr. Speaker the main provisions of the bill allow the minister responsi-ble for electricity to make an order with the approval of the Minister of Finance acquiring all such prop-erty as may be required to assume control over the supply of electric-ity in Belize and that is because a situation has been reached with the Belize Electricity Limited the sole supplier of electricity to the public in this country which makes clear that BEL is currently unable to pay for the power that it must purchase in order to transmit electricity to the nation. The current inability of BEL to pay for the electricity which it is to trans-mit to the public has been a devel-oping story for some time now. But things started coming to a head when an SOS was call in to me at the end of April by Mr. Lynn Young the CEO of BEL and of May 4th as a follow up to that meeting Mr. Young wrote to me. It is worth Mr. Speaker quoting ex-cerpts from that letter. This is impor-tant - the last excerpt from the letter Mr. Speaker. “Since the government is party to the agreements with CFE and BECOL as well as the loan agree-ments with CDB, IBRD and the EIB and thus exposed - we are seeking the government assistance in helping the company to manage its way through this very difficult period”. That last part is extremely important - there are those who say ‘you take over

BEL, you have to pay the liabilities. Why are you assuming those liabili-ties?’ what is made clear here is that we were going to assume them in any case because government is guaran-tor. The rest of the story to this point is well know Mr. Speaker. Mr. Young and I spoke on the phone before his trip that he took along with Senator Eamon Courtenay and FORTIS’ Stan Marshall to go see the IMF and the World Bank in Washington on June 6th. Then we met on Friday of that week. None of what was suggested was acceptable to the government of Belize. How could they be? First of all; government was entirely unsure how BEL had got itself into its pre-dicament in its first place and that’s the question that everybody is ask-ing? How does BEL get to where it says it is? So being unsure of what had really happen government could not simply continue to hand over tax payers’ monies to a company over which it had no control.I asked him to find out if Fortis would be willing to sell to GOB. And since the reply was couched in a take it or leave it manner, we wrote to Fortis’s lawyer Eamon Courtenay saying we would leave it. Some may argue we should have made a counter-offer. But the peremptory nature of the Fortis response convinced us of the futility of that. After all, I had asked Mr Young to procure from Fortis a time and place for negotiations in the event Fortis was willing to sell. The fact that the Fortis answer deliberate-ly omitted to do that, was a message that was hard to miss.When we gave that 4 million dollars last Wednesday we thought it would buy us a couple of weeks. But it turned out that in addition to the just under 10 million owed to CFE for power, and the 12 million to BECOL, BEL also owed 5.1 million to BEL-COGEN as of the BELCOGEN’s May invoice. Still, BEL was giving none of the four million dollars that we gave them last Wednesday to BELCOGEN, I have the break down of how they were portioning that 4 million. The bulk of it were going to CFE, some was going to FORTIS and some was going the EIB. None was going to BELCOGEN. And that became a real tipping point. BELCO-GEN needs money to service its own foreign debts, which are cross-refer-enced to the BSI sugar factory loans.Without BEL as a buyer in good standing, BELCOGEN would ulti-mately also collapse. And because of the cross-default clauses, if the BELCOGEN loans are called the BSI loans are also called. It was therefore critical, in my view, that BELCOGEN should be able to as-sure its creditors that it will be able to collect for its electricity sales to BEL and the only way that can happen is if government is in charge and makes those payments. Otherwise, exit now the entire sugar industry and forget everything Government had already done last year by way of rescue.The six thousand cane farmers and their families would never forgive us, the nation would never forgive us. It was in all these circumstances and the way things were ramifying that we decided there was no further time to spare. And so government is act-ing today by way of this Bill. There is simply no alternative and for all the reasons I have recited we must now urgently take over BEL in the public interest.

I will wrap up now by talking about how we will handle the transition. No one at BEL need fear for their job. I have spoken to officials of the BEL workers union, which fully supports Government in its move, and com-municated this to them. It is the same thing with management. Mr Young has already indicated that he will not stay, and there are suggestions that other members of Executive Man-agement might also wish to go. We have our plans in place for that even-tuality. But nobody will be forced out

and managers are free to stay if they wish.The point I am making is that the government has every faith that we can make this work. All the skeptics - the Chicken Littles that decry a GOB takeover on the ground that it will lessen efficiency need to screw their courage to the sticking place.”Author’s note: Special thanks to Ju-les Vasquez and Channel 7 without whose assistance and permission this piece could not have been pro-duced.

Tuesday 21st June 2011Fortis Inc., Canada’s biggest publicly traded utility, lost its ownership inter-est in a Belize power company after the Belize government seized the assets. Fortis holds an approximate 70 percent interest in BEL, the main electricity distributor in Belize, the St. John’s, Newfoundland based-company said today in a statement. The stake represents less than 2 percent of the company’s total assets of C$12.9 billion ($13.3 billion) as of March 31, 2011, the company said. A spokeswoman for Fortis did not immediately return a call seeking comment. The action stemmed from a dispute over a requested rate increase in 2008, the government of Belize said in an e-mailed statement. The government took over the company to ensure an uninterrupted supply of electricity, said Joseph Waight, financial secretary of the Belize Ministry of Finance, in a telephone interview. Fortis received notification of Belize’s asset possession today, the company said. The government of Belize has not served an expropriation order for For-tis’s ownership of Belize Electric Company Ltd., a non-regulated business that operates three hydroelectric plants in the Central American country. Fortis fell 3 cents to C$32.01 at 4:10 p.m. in trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange. As a result of the Expropriation Belize Credit Rating May Be Cut by S&P The report said that Belize’s credit rating may be cut by Standard & Poor’s after the government moved to seize control of the country’s sole electricity provider.S&P, which rates Belize’s foreign and local debt B, five levels below invest-ment grade, said in a statement that it cut the outlook on the credit to negative as the government sought to take over majority ownership of Belize Elec-tricity Ltd. from Canadian utility company Fortis Inc. The government’s ex-propriation is designed to ensure the continuity of electricity to the Central American country after Belize Electricity’s management reported “difficulties in meeting financial obligations,” S&P said.“This transaction has the potential to increase the government’s already high debt level substantially and weaken its debt-servicing capacity,” S&P said in the statement.Fortis said it was told of Belize’s seizure today. Fortis holds a 70 percent stake in BEL, which represents less than 2 percent of the the St. John’s, New-foundland-based company’s total assets of C$12.9 billion ($13.3 billion) as of March 31, 2011, the company said.A message left for a press official at Fortis seeking additional comment after normal business hours wasn’t returned.The seizure stemmed from a dispute over a requested rate increase in 2008, the government of Belize said in an e-mailed statement.The takeover order calls for compensation to be made to shareholders at “fair value,’’ said Joseph Waight, financial secretary of the Belize Ministry of Fi-nance, in a telephone interview.Analyst Roberto Sifon-Arevalo said the nation’s move to acquire a control-ling share of Belize Electricity Ltd. could hurt the government’s credit profile. The transaction has the potential to increase the government’s already high debt level substantially, and could also weaken its debt-servicing capacity, according to S&P. Currently, Canada-based utility Fortis Inc. (FTS.T) owns 70% of the nation’s sole electricity provider’s equity, with the Belize Social Security Board own-ing 26% and various investors holding the rest. The proposed bill would allow the government to take over Fortis’s stake, with an estimated book value of $100 million. The government began to pursue the acquisition when Belize Electricity’s management reported difficulties in meeting financial obligations and cover-ing the utility’s operating costs. In S&P’s view, it believes the government’s motive is to ensure the continuity of the country’s electricity supply. S&P currently rates foreign- and local-currency sovereign credit ratings at B, which is five levels into junk.

Fortis Loses Stake in Belize Company in Government TakeoverAs a result of the Expropriation: Belize

Credit Rating May Be Cut by S&P


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Featured RecipesPage 16

Lemon Garlic Chicken

Servings:4

Cooking Time:20 minutes

Ingredients:

4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves 1 tsp paprika salt and pepper to taste 2 tbsp margarine or butter 2 cloves of garlic, minced 2 tbsp lemon juice ½ tsp grated lemon zest ¼ cup white wine

Instructions:

Sprinkle chicken with paprika, salt and pepper. Melt the butter or margarine in a large skillet over medium-high heat, also, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Once the pan is hot, add the chicken to the skillet. Sauté the chicken for about 2-3 minutes on each side or until it begins to brown slightly. Remove the chicken and place on a baking sheet. Pour half of the lemon juice over the chicken and then place the sheet in the oven and set the timer for 5 minutes. Add the garlic to the hot pan and sauté until it begins to brown (about 1-2 minutes). Add the white wine to the pan to de-glace. After about a minute or two, add the lemon zest to the pan. Reduce by half, then cover and set aside. By now the timer should have gone off. Use the remaining lemon juice to pour over the chicken once again and set the timer for another 5 minutes. Once the chicken is done (it may need another minute or two depend-ing on how thick they are), place over a dish of Spanish or vermicelli rice, and pour the sauce overtop liberally. Garnish with some lemon-twists and a few sprigs of fresh herbs like sage or basil.

For a little color and extra fl avor, add fi nely diced red peppers and a little lemon zest to the rice as it’s simmering. Or let the chicken cool, then add it to a tossed salad for an excellent lunchtime meal!

Aries-You need to say no to new activities this week-- not because you aren’t ready for them, but because you need to focus on whatever is right in front of you. Midweek is a much better time for exploring and taking action. Your good energy should push you in interesting new directions at this time. You’re somewhat more focused on your possessions than usual as the weekend begins; you may need to deal with car or house re-pairs. Take it easy try to defer any heavy emotional business until later. Taurus-You’re in a really good, solid position this week -- so much so that you may want to take a risk and get started on projects that seem pretty far-out or unfathomable. Don’t let anyone rush you, though you can be certain that certain people will try. Dig in your heels and do things at the pace you know they need to be done. The weekend should be great fun, as you’re in a good mood and ought to have some entertaining activities planned. Slow down just a little bit.

Gemini-Your job is taking up more of your mental energy than usual, but it shouldn’t be any more stressful. Apply yourself and you might impress exactly the right person! You may want to keep pushing throughout the week, in fact, as your tenacity is a key selling point for bosses or clients. At some point, you need to take a little time out to reconnect with your core goals; speaking with a family member you respect may be the key. You should be largely free of responsibilities on Sunday. Cancer-Your intuitive powers are quite strong -- maybe even eerie -- early this week, so pay attention to what your gut is trying to say and then take quick action but things should settle down a bit in your life, though others are running around like crazed pup-pies. Take some time to refl ect on where you’ve been lately. The early part of the weekend is a great time to take care of domestic matters, from paying bills to intense family discussions. Make sure you’re listening carefully to what your friends are saying.Leo-Though you may not be in the best mood ever, you do have a creative edge that forces you to see the world differ-ently. It might be a good time for you to try something new and adventurous. This week brings someone into your life that opens up a few new possibilities that are equally exciting and intimidating. Pick and choose and see where they lead. Issues with authority tie up your weekend, though you ought to be able to talk your way out of any long-term repercussions. Virgo-Say no to anything that comes your way and involves shuffl ing around work or personal projects. You just don’t have enough time or space quite yet! If anyone persists, you may lash out at them. Thanks to an infusion of feisty energy that makes you quick to defend your interests (as well as those of the people you love). Settle down somewhat and become more contemplative, possibly diving into a new book or con-versation that provokes deep thought. Libra-Your eye for beauty is a key asset early in the week, letting you help someone who really needs you. It’s a good chance to forge a stronger relationship, and you should fi nd things picking up after just a few days. It’s a great time to advance romantic part-nerships or pursue new work buddies. The weekend require your objective judgment -- though you may fi nd it diffi cult to keep from taking sides before you’ve heard everyone speak. Sunday brings a wave of mental energy that’s great for getting things done. Scorpio-You start to see new possibilities in an old situation early this week, and your imagination is enough to get you moving in a bold new direction. Everything seems to line up for you, as long as you’re taking the initiative and getting started on whatever’s fi ring you up. Watch out for a too-intense focus -- you don’t want to neglect any of the important parts of your life while chasing your dream! The fi ne print might trip you up next week if you don’t take a little extra time to look at it on Sunday. Sagittarius-You see or overhear something that resonates with you -- and reminds you of a troubling situation in your own life. You may want to ponder this for a while to see if you can draw out any lessons. Your love life improves quite by midweek, even if you had thought it was already as good as it could possibly be! It all boils down to having fun with the right person. You may be motivated to help out around the house or in the community, and that spirit is rewarded handsomely. Capricorn-Your intuitive powers are almost overwhelming this week-- but make sure you listen! Your gut is trying to tell you something of paramount importance. If you get bad news midweek (things could go either way for you), make sure not to give up. Your persistence will guarantee the best possible outcome. You deserve a break from the hustle and bustle, and your good energy should allow you to make the most eco-nomical use of your time. Aquarius-Your spiritual side is making noises this week -- noises that you would do well to listen to with care. There’s more going on around you than you realize, but you can fi nd a more peaceful way to live if you want. You should be amazed at the results, thanks to quick integration of your new understanding. Watch out for a little emotional crash later in the week that manifests more as boredom than depression. Hey, life can’t be a roller coaster all the time! Pisces-You have the fi rst couple of days of the week to apply your terrifi c energy to pretty much any project that appeals to you -- or to reserve it for later and just enjoy each day as it comes. A mys-tery appears which absorbs you for a little while, though you’re just as likely to walk away from it after a while as you are to solve it. You’ve got something to say but your excellent word choice and pre-sentation may be covering up hidden feelings, especially resentment.


Page 16












MarriagesAntonio Jaime Smith to Chyna Vasthy Alvarez both of Santa Elena Town, CayoCefas Severo Tzib to Malery Mesh both of San Antonio, CayoSamuel Manuel Tzib to Shahira Odelis Tzib both of San Antonio, CayoAmauri Tzib to Daisy Aguirres both of Cristo Rey, CayoJavony Darren Staine to Sylvia Indira Magandi both of Belize CityJohn William Bowden to Martha Clarice Ramirez both of British Co-lumbia, CanadaAlvin Sydney Lino to Nicole Elizabeth Craig both of Georgia, USARobin Perdomo to Alba Rosa Chata both of San Lazaro, Orange WalkJamar Brian Thompson to Jessica Mirita Cristine Wagner both of Roaring Creek, CayoEdwin Rolando Lopez to Rachel Elizabeth Studley both of Belmopan, CayoSamuel Neal to Tomasa Coc both of Camalote, CayoVandy Glenn Gonzalez to Majbritt Lise Munck both Corozal Town, CorozalEdgardo Irving Gideon to Lizett Magalie Martinez both of Orange Walk Town, Orange WalkQing Jie Zhu to Jie Mei Gong both of San Ignacio, CayoYae Chao Huang to Fen Fen Zhen both of San Ignacio, CayoColin Campbell Brown to Rhonda Marie Olmeim both of Hopkins, Minnesota, USABryan Peter Kazmar to Jennifer Shaw Fischer both of Nevada, USAMicah Alexander Blum to Nicole Christine Geary both of Minneapo-lis, Minnesota, USAStephen James Pettigrew to Brandy Marie Workman both of Pennsyl-vania, USAKevin Edward Tucker of Belize City to Marsha Naika Lopez both of Illinois, USAGregorio Antonio Ruelas to Yolanda Gonzalez both of California, USAChristopher John Usher to Tamisha Kareema Hernandez both of Stann Creek Allan Peter Halowski to Donna Rene Beckles both of Alberta, CanadaElroy Clinton Tucker to Rochelle Louise Flowers both of Belize CityGerald Alfred Gillett Jr. to Abigail Dorcas Ochoa both of BelmopanRoger Alfonso Briceno to Yasmin Grisel Mendez both of San Pablo, orange WalkKenneth Alfred Welch of Gales Point, Belize to Una Melinda Galvez of Belize CityLeonel Najarro to Bania Gabriela Lopez Paz both of San Pedro, Am-bergris CayeClifford Friesen to Myra Thiessen both of Spanish Lookout, CayoVicente Hernandez to Concepcion Lemus both of Trio, ToledoEric Elred Longsworth to Elra Andrea Coleman both of Independence, Stann CreekOscar Galdamez to Marina Ondina Carias both of Cowpen, Stann CreekJermain Jason Joel Watson to Marleny Nicole Muschamp both of Independence, Stann CreekBurrell Lewis Young of South Carolina, USA to Greysi Gabriela Orel-lano Mancia of La Ceiba, HondurasIsidro Emmanuel Beaton to Sharon Anita Trapp both of Belize CityKeith Faber to Alicia Maria Wade both of Belize City

BirthsCadron Rejean to Abram and Irene Penner nee ReimerCandace Adar to Glenn Allen and Tanisha Crawford nee WestbyAbram to Jacob and Eva PetersSeth Caleb to George Michael and Lisa Dee Ann Jones nee SalazarJahvir Jacey to Benjamin Ernesto Jr. to Pauline Marie Moguel nee CastroTrineicy Carial to Herbert Livingston and Carial Alice Martells nee BaintonDenzel Anthony to Michael Anthony and Tracie Jenkins nee man-zaneroAizriel Howard to Bobby Gary and Marie Julia Martinez nee GaliciaFrancisco Estuardo to Alvaro Francisco and Queila Anabelie Kotch nee Suchite.

DeathsDonovan Nelson Bailey, 30Kenyon Anthony Plunkett, 29Ismarl Ivanhoe Ortiz, 76John Alexander Brakeman, 74Ignacio Rodriguez Noh, 65Veronica Tucker, 90

Summer Seasonal Apparel

Seasonal clothes are fun to watch out for since it creates an exciting sensation as you wait for the next fashion trend. Although several clothes might just be worn per season, the brighter side is that you get to wear more kinds of clothes. It allows you not to be impul-sive on other kinds of clothes because you know that the season will eventu-ally change.On the other hand, one of the ideal shopping tips for seasonal clothing is to shop ahead or once a particular season is over. More often, stores go on a huge sale once a particular season is over. It is best to purchase clothes that are out of season since you will be able to get it at its cheapest price. Don’t worry be-cause you will still get to wear them. Just exert a little patience in waiting for the particular season to return.For the winter season, gather up some leather jackets which have thick lin-ings. This will take you a long way be-cause of the sturdiness of the material. Keep it in a good storage place, or wrap it up in plastic to maintain its quality.Take out your light clothes and cool dresses during the spring season as this may be the perfect weather for those kinds of clothes. Spring clothes are very fun to wear since they are cool and colorful. Clothes especially for spring fashion are light and made with thin fabric. This is the time for you to let go of all the heavy garments you’ve worn over the winter season.As summer comes in, your preference of clothes are becoming more comfort-able.A lot of new trends are advancing in be-cause of a cast new division advancing aloft us. Summer is the time to accom-pany out the ablaze dresses and get rid of those apparel that are bulky. Here are some basal summer fashion tips to ad-vice you with authoritative abiding that you get the best this year.This is the perfect time for chiffon clothes because of its very light and thin material. Cotton garments are also perfectly worn during the summer sea-son since it allows air to pass through it making you feel cooler during this very warm season.1. Attending for the basics and banal up on them. There are a lot of acces-sories out there that you’ll acquisition

will alloy in with about any affectionate of summer outfi t. You can banal your apparel with ablaze denims, biscuit and even linen. Addition affair to anticipate about is catchbasin tops. You’ll acquisi-tion all sorts of artist appearance catch-basin acme accessible and those can advice you for if you wish to go on the bank or just accept a picnic.2. Attending through all of your shoes and box up the winter ones. People ac-complish the aberration of demogra-phy up amplitude with abrogation out their boots during the summer. You can acquisition covering heels and sum-mer cossack accessible in boots that will feel abundant additional generally times lighter than the approved summer boot. Failing sneakers that are canvas are a abundant way to go. If you are into sandals again anticipate about possibly accepting block sandals. There are as well affl uence of beautiful sandals out there for that adult dress.3. Attending at the trends and chase them. Every year the trends change. Don’t put on endure year’s admired dress because you like it so much. Learn to let go of old clothes and acquisition some new all time admired ones for that year. If you don’t apperceive what to do with your old clothes again accord them to charity. Try and actualize a cast new summer apparel every year if you can allow it. You don’t accept to bandy abroad all of your clothes. Plain black clothes attending acceptable behind-hand of what the trend ability be.4. Always try and awning up during the summer. It’s alarming if you accept a adult dress on but accumulate in ap-perception that sometimes accepting it appearance all of the time ability get arid and not as fun. Uncover the derma during those nice adventurous dates. Wear cottony scarves and blanket some accouterment about your shoulders. Accepting some failing cardigans is as well addition abundant way to attend-ing adult and decent.5. Be calm, adult and cool. Acquisition some lip balm, or get some nice phy-sique aerosol and put it on you. There are as well affl uence of hair ties out there that attending sexy. Accomplish abiding that whatever you put in your hair, matches with what you’ve current-ly got on. If you’re cutting a red dress, don’t put on blush hair bows.

Sunday,June 26th, 2011

Belize City, June 19, 2011 Team Benny’s Megabytes’ Byron Pope won the elite road race while Team Cayo High Road’s Juan Umana won the junior race of the 19th annual Be-lize Cycling Association’s national road c h a m p i o n -ships on Sun-day, June 19. Byron Pope clocked 5:11:41 on his 117.4 mile ride from Silk Grass Village on the southern Highway on to Hummingbird Highway to Belmo-pan, on to the Western Highway to Hattieville, through the bypass road to Burrell Boom and on to the Northern High-way to finish in front of the Belize Bank build- i n g . Pope had also clocked 46:35 to win the 20-mile time trial on the Burrell Boom bypass road on Sunday June 11. Team Western Spirits’ Geovanni Choto placed 2nd second place, while Choto’s Team Western Spirits’ Shane Vasquez, the first over 30 masters rider, clocked 5:11:54 to take 3rd place, also winning the over-30 cat-egory. He had also clocked 46:54 in the Mover-30 asters 20-mile time tri-als, while Leroy Cassasola clocked 47:27 to place 2nd and Quinton Ham-ilton clocked 50:33 to palce 3rd . Team Santino’s Jairo Campos clocked 5:12:12 to take 4th in the road race, and

Byron Pope & Juan Umana win 19th annual BCA national road championships

2nd in the under-23 category. Greg-ory Lovell, riding un-attached,

c l o c k e d 5:12:18 for his 5th place

finish. Campos had also clocked 49:46 in the time trials to win 2nd among the u-23 riders. Taric Cano clocked 50:11 for 3rd place in the U-23 time trials. Team C-ray’s Brandon Cattouse was 6th in the road race, but clocked 46:38 to win the elite category in the 20-mile time trials, while Greg Lovell clocked 46:53 for 2nd place and Dar-nell Barrow timed 48:38 for 3rd place. Team Western Spirits’ Jose Choto, the second over-30 masters, was 7th in the road race. Team Typhoon’s Nissan Arana from Orange walk fin-ished 8th, and D&D consultancy’s Kyne Gentle, the third u-23 rider, clocked 5:13:43 as he finished 9th. Team Santino’s Leroy Cassasola, the

3rd over-30 Mas-

ters rider, clocked 5:13:55 as he fin-ished 10th. Erwin Middleton of team Indeco was 11th and Darnell Bar-row of the Santino’s team was 12th. Team Cayo High Road’s Juan Uma-na clocked 4:07:57 as he won the 88-mile junior race. Tteam Inde-co’s Geovanni Lovell was 2nd but placed first in the youth category. Team Cayo Uprising’s Oscar Quiros finished 3rd , but was 2nd among the Youth riders. Anfernee Young clocked 29:16 when he won the youth category in the 12-mile indi-vidual time trials in the week before, while Quiros clocked 29:26 for 2nd M&M engineering’s Kiron Morrison

w a s 4 t h i n t h e r o a d r a c e w h i l e C a y o H i g h Road’s A i d e n Juan, the 3rd Youth rider, fin-ished 5th. T e a m D & D

C o n - s u l -tancy’s Austin Armstrong was 6th, Team Cayo Uprising’s Adrian Lin-eras was 7th, M&M engineering’s Quinn McGregor was 8th, and Clear di Land’s Jafari Castro was 9th. Team INDECO’s Junior Cross Country champ Joel Borland was 10th, while Christopher Sandoval clocked 4:16:14 as he finished 11th, while Gian Zetina clocked 4:22:00 for his 12th place fin-ish. Borland also won the junior indi-vidual time trials in 29:54, while Juan Umana was second in 30:28 and Chris-topher Sandoval was 3rd in 31:33.

Belize City, June 19, 2011 Team Sagitun’s Shalini Zabaneh and M&M engineering’s Liam Stu-art won the Women’s and Masters categories of the 19th annual Belize Cycling Association’s national road championships on Sunday, June 19. Shalini Zabaneh beat many of the men when she clocked 3:43:49 on her 74.2 ride from St. Margaret’s Village on the Hummingbird Highway. She had also clocked 30:21 to win the individ-ual 12-mile time trials on the Burrel boom bypass road on Sunday, June 12. Team Benny’s Megabytes Patricia Chavarria clocked 3:50:51 as she won 2nd among the women, she had also

Shalini Zabaneh & Liam Stuart win 19th annual BCA national road championships

placed 2nd in the time trials in 34:47. Jane Usher riding unattached clocked 4:11:01 for her 3rd place finish. Smooth Sailing’s Kirah Eiley was 4th in 4:30:19 seconds and Team INDECO’s Jamaila Requena was ahrd on her wheel. Jamaila clocked 35:47 in the time trials. M&M engineering Scotish import, Liam Stuart, who has become a natu-ralized Belizean, won the over-40 masters race solo in 3:41:34. Mike Lewis riding unattached, rode in sec-ond in three hours 42 minutes and 42 seconds. Wilbert Jones, also un-attached pulled in third in three hours 43 minutes and 49 seconds. Kenneth Butler of M&M Engineering team was fourth in three hours 47 min-

utes and 12 seconds, with his teammate Windell Williams hard on his wheel to take fifth place. Luigi Urbina of the Team Typhoon was sixth in three hours 52 minutes with George Abraham Sr

of Benny’s Megabytes taking seventh place and Preston Martinez of M&M’s placing eighth. John Newport of Ben-ny’s Megabytes pulled in ninth in four hours five minutes and 43 seconds.

Sunday,June 26th, 2011

Belize City, June 19, 2011

City Boys & Paradise Freedom Fighters rule Belize Bank Superleague football

The Raymond Gentle City Boys and the Paradise Freedom Fighters both post-ed their 2nd wins of the Belize Bank Superleague football playoffs to lead-ing the standings with 6pts each. The City Boys ran over the Or-ange Walk united 4-0 at the MCC grounds on Sunday, while the Freedom Fighters drilled the Pla-cencia Assassins 1-0 at the To-ledo Union field in Punta Gorda on Sunday afternoon, June 19. Deon McCauley and Tyrone “T-bone” Muschamp led the City boys’ offensive with the help of Jason Young and Leon “Lem’ Jones on the wings, supported by David “Dav” McCauley and Ryan Simpson at midfield. McCauley demonstrated his brilliance that has caught the eye of interna-tional coaches, when he scored City boys first winning goal af-ter some 22 minutes of action. Oliver Hendricks, Dean Flow-ers and Jarret Davis led the visi-tors’ counterattack supported by Edwin Gillett and Marlon Miranda on the wings and Lorenzo “Lencho” Diaz and Chris Hendricks at midfield. They

made no impression on the City Boys’ defense anchored by Eian Gaynair with the help of Shawn Thurton, Mark Grant and Nigel Franklin who held the

visitors scoreless, while Tyrone Mus-champ embarrassed goalkeeper Char-lie Slusher with a second goal nine

minutes later to lead 2-0 at intermission In the second half, Orange Walk’s tech-nical director Jorge Nunes refreshed his attack line with Orrin “Sonny” Wade Jr

relieving Dean Flowers and Andrew Allen replacing Marlon Miranda, while City boys’ Brian Martinez took over

from Leon Jones, but Tyrone Mus-champ kept alive a play by McCauley, and Ryan Simpson connected with the finish to give City boys a 3-0 lead some

27 minutes into the second half. Jack Dawson replaced Simpson soon after, while Nunes introduced Gabriel Perez for Diaz , but it was Deon McCauley who caught up to a forward pass from Muschamp and sliced the ball into the narrow crack of light between Slusher and the near upright to score the fourth goal some 11 minutes before the long whistle. Orange Walk United will try for better result when they host the city boys at the people’s Stadium on Saturday night. The Placencia Assassins held the Freedom Fighters to a scoreless draw up to intermission, but some 10 minutes into the second half, the Placencia defense blundered into giving up a penalty and Alexan-der Peters converted for Freedom Fighters to post a 1-0 win. The Pla-cencia Assassins will try to exploit

the home field advantage for a win in the rematch with the Freedom Fight-ers in Placencia on Saturday night.

but the University of Belize Jaguars forced a Game 3 by a 98-88 win in Game 2 last Wednesday night. Win-ston Pratt drained in 3 treys to lead UB with 30 pts, 12 rebounds an UB were up 27-19 in the 1st quarter. UB’s Farron Louriaino added 25 pts, 9 rebounds for UB to lead 43-41 at the half. MVP Gene Myvett led the Tiger-sharks with 35pts, 4 rebounds and Alex Carcamo added 17 pts, 16 rebounds, but UB opened up a 70-62 spread by the end of the 3rd quarter. Daniel Nol-berto drained in 3 long treys to add 14pts, and Alfred Bainton had 11pts, 7 rebounds in the win. Tigersharks’ Lester Cadle and Leroy Louriano each scored 11pts, Louriano had 7 rebounds, and Doug Penland added 10pts. In Game 3 on Friday, the Tigersharks won 96-84, led by Alex Carcamo with 33pts, 19 rebounds as Tigersharks led 21-20 in the 1st quarter. UB’s Winston

San Pedro Tigersharks win Digicell senior basketball championship

Belize City, June 17, 2011 The San Pedro Tigersharks won the Belize Telemedia “Digicel Bal-lin for Life” senior basketball

championship at the Belize City Center on Friday night, June 17. The Tigersharks had won Game 1 of the series 85-74 on Monday night,

Pratt had 24pts, 6 rebounds and Farron Louriano added 14pts, 10 rebounds as UB took over the lead 40-39 at the half. Tigersharks’ Lester Cadle drainedin 6 long treys to add 18pts, while Gene Myvett added 14 pts, 7 rebounds. UB’s Ryan Zuniga scored 12pts and Stephen “Muerte” Williams hit 2 long treys to add 10 pts, 6 re-bounds but UB was still down 66-68 at the end of the 3rd quarter. Doug Penland hit 3 treys for 13pts while Leroy Louriano added 11pts, 5 rebounds for the Tigersharks to lead 82-72 with 5 minutes left on the clock. UB’s Daniel Nolberto had 10pts, 5 rebounds and Matthew Young 11pts, 7 rebounds in the loss. Gene Myvette won Most Valuable Player award as well as Top Scorer and Best Defensive player awards. Kevin Siroki got Most Assists, and Leroy Louriano got Most Steals. Maxboro Mavericks’ Dwayne Davis won the award for Most Rebounds.

Belize City, June 17, 2011 The Silver Creek RC School girls from the Toledo district are nation-al primary schools football cham-pions, winning the National Sports Council’s all-day tournament at the MCC garden on Friday, June 17. In Game 1, the Belize district champs, the Our Lady of Lourdes RC School girls from Maskall outlasted the Cayo district champs from Santa Elena School: 3-2. Hadassah Cas-tro, Linda Campos and Renie Petil-lo scored 1 goal each for maskall, while Santa Elena’s Leinny Jones and Sheriece Williams scored 1 goal each. In Game 2, the Orange Walk dis-trict champs, the Chan Pine Ridge Government School girls burned the

Silver Creek girls win national primary schools football championships

Stann Creek district champs, the Sa-cred Heart RC School girls 1-0, with Milca Torres scoring the winning goal. In Game 3, the Santa Elena School girls stopped the Corozal district champs, the Our Lady of Guadalupe School girls, 2-1. Deyana Villanueva and Sheriece Williams scored 1 goal each for Cayo, while only Esmeral-da Zetina scored a goal for Corozal. In Game 4, the Silver Creek RC School girls blasted the Chan Pine Ridge girls 4-1 in penalty shootout, after regula--1 in penalty shootout, after regula-tion time ended 0-0. Silver Creek’s Bernadita Yatz, Hilaria Choj, Susana Pop and MVP Petrona Cal scored their penalties and only Cristina Cart-agena scored for Chan Pine Ridge. In Game 5, the Maskall girls moved on to the semifinals when they elimi-nated the Corozal girls 2-1, when

Renie Petillo and Leyandra Henry scored 1 goal each for Our Lady of Lourdes RC School and only Es-meralda Zetina scored for Corozal. In Game 6, Silver Creek RC School also qualified to the semifinals by a 4-0 win to eliminate the Stann Creek girls, with Blanca Tiul scor-ing 2 goals, and MVP Petrona Cal and Darlene Yatz scored 1 goal each. In Game 7, the Maskall girls moved up to the championship final by out-gunning the Chan Pine Ridge girls 3-0 in a penalty shootout after regu-lation time ended with the game was tied 1-1 when Deizy Torres had scored for Chan Pine ridge. Hadas-sah Castro, Kayla Reneau and Ley-andra Henry scored their penalties, while Chan Pine Ridge scored none. In Game 8, the Silver Creek girls also moved up to the championship final by a 2-1 win over the Cayo girls; Darlene Yatz and MVP Petrona Cal scored 1 goal each for Silver Creek and only Deyana Villanueva scored a goal for Cayo. In Game 9, the Chan Pine Ridge

Gov’t School won the consolation gamme for 3rd place 1-0 over the Cayo girls, when Cristina Cartagena scored in sudden death penalty shoot-out. In regulation time the game was tied 0-0, and the penalty shoot-out was tied 3-3 after 5 tires each. In Game 10 the championship final, the Silver Creek girls won 2 -0 over the Maskall girls when MVP award win-ner Petrona Cal scored 2 goals in the 2nd half.

national perspective june 26, 2011

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