Luckily the venerable Mr. Lindo hasn’t made any adverse public
pronouncement on the Seventh Amendment to the Constitution Bill. It proposes
to establish the Caribbean Court of Justice as the final court of appeal for
belize and to allow dual nationals to be members of the National Assembly. Just
about everyone agrees with the first, but the second one is highly controversial.
But tonight, actually in about 20 minutes Belize City residents have a chance
to let your views on it be heard. The House Committee on Constitution and Foreign
Affairs is holding its first consultation in Belize City. The Leader of the
Opposition John Briceno is a member and he feels it was too hurriedly put together.
Hon. Johnny Briceno, PUP Leader
“Well we had our National Party Council meeting Saturday and we made
a presentation, our legal advisor and a team of attorneys went through the proposed
recommendations or to the seventh amendment and everyone in the party believes
that the issue of dual citizenship to serve in the National Assembly is simply
wrong and it is something that we cannot support. We believe that you can’t
have two masters. It is a privilege, it is an honour to represent the people
of this country, be it as elected in the House of Representatives or be it that
you’re appointed as a Senator. It is a great privilege for us to be in
that position and we at all time need to ensure and point out to the Belizean
people that we have one master and that master is Belize and Belize alone.
There is going to be a consultation tonight of which unfortunately I believe
that enough notice was not given. We got a letter on Monday where they were
listing the different dates and places where they were going to have these consultations.
The committee did not even meet, I am a member of that committee, so when I
got that, it was also surprising. We believe that if the government is serious
about these consultations, I think they need to do more, they need to advertise
it more.”
Hon. Patrick Faber,
“Everybody knows that within the 90 days period we have to do these
consultations. So people need to be prepared. It is unfortunate yes that this
first one, people can say that they don’t know, but we’ve tried
our best to make it very…”
Jules Vasquez,
“Two days.”
Hon. Patrick Faber,
“Yes two days and if it is an issue that is so big then people will
make their way to the Bishop Sylvestre Center.”
Jules Vasquez,
“So are you prepared to say that the dual citizenship amendment which
has caused such a firestorm of debate, that that is negotiable or open to deletion
from the seventh amendment package?”
Hon. Patrick Faber,
“Indeed. I will tell you, I am hoping this will not be deemed a breach
of the confidence of the Cabinet, but that was the instruction by the Prime
Minister yesterday in the Cabinet meeting, that this committee will have all
rights to make the changes that people make recommendations for.”
Again, that consultation starts at 7:30 at the Bishop Sylvester Memorial
Center.
Email
Print