While Belize's house of Representatives is known to be "bouncious" and there's lots of bullying and backtalk across the floor, we can't say the history is very colorful.
Until Mark Espat and Cordel Hyde bombed their own party from the backbench in 2005 and voted against that year's Musa budget, things had been fairly staid, most representatives toed the party line or kept quiet.
But now it seems rebel UDP Representative from Orange Walk East Marcel Cardona is making history on the regular. He lashed out at his party in spectacular, theatrical fashion in the budget debate back in March - and yesterday made a slightly more dubious kind of parliamentary history when he was stoned by a guest in the gallery.
We didn't get to feature it properly last night with all the news relating to the re-acquisition of Telemedia - but tonight we look at it with more precision. It started with Cardona speaking against the re-nationalization and then refusing to vote either for or against it, which provoked howls form across the floor and the gallery. Here's what happened next:
Jules Vasquez Reporting:
Hon. Marcel Cardona - Orange Walk East Representative
"I wish to state for the record, Mr. Prime Minister, and this is directed to the PM. PM listen, for the record, if - the people of Orange Walk East elected me - if you want me out, call elections now! Call elections now, you have the power! Call it now! Call Elections now, and let us see if you will remain Prime Minister!"
It was an incredible outburst, the ferocity, the pace, the manic intensity, the man stab pointed his finger 44 times in 27 seconds - including one flurry in which he did it 11 times in four seconds, that's 3 finger stabs per second! Talk about intensity, passion...
But the more animated he got the more the UDP supporters in the gallery got riled up. A`nd after Cardona hastily fumbled with his portfolio, all the while still talking and pointing, that's when an over the top heckler in the gallery pulled out his wallet - yes his wallet, and stoned Cardona in the head at close range. It apparently caught the side of his face or the right shoulder - you can see Cardona flinch when it hits.
Stunned, but undeterred, he hesitates slightly thinking to go pick up the wallet - but the chamber is now a den, the roar of the gallery too great, and Cardona beats a retreat.
The Speaker immediately ordered that the heckler be put out of the House. He was banned for two sittings.
And while Cardona has made some theatrical flourishes - that's all it has been really: theatre, because both times he has abstained from voting on the bills he criticized, falling short of the benchmark set by Espat and Hyde who voted against their own governing majority three times in 2005...
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