And while there will always be political tension across the house floor, rarely, very rarely, the two sides can share a grace note. Today was one such occasion. Near the end of the House Meeting, Leader of the Opposition John Briceno and PM Barrow had a courteous and heartfelt exchange - both honoring women on International Women's Day which was observed yesterday. But of course house meetings wouldn't be house meetings without the usual jabs - but this one between Barrow and Briceno was laced with good humor.
Hon. John Briceno, PUP Party Leader
"I want to take the opportunity to greet all Belizean women and our Belizean women are quite outstanding human beings in Belize. So any of them single mothers who are out there toiling every single day working, trying to make ends meet for their children. We have some very strong women and I will use the Prime Minister's wife as an example when she had cancer she made it public and to show that you can fight and don't give up, just like my mother when she had cancer unfortunately she did not make it but I remember one day when I was all broken up she looked at me and said she is okay, she is not... , you know we men we would dead over something like that and they are very calm, cool and collected and they give you that strength and I want to take this opportunity to congratulate all Belizean women. At the same time I want to thank all Belizean who went to the polls on Wednesday and it shows that once again we have a vibrant democracy and that people went out peacefully, each side fighting for their own sides and they went out and they spoke and we accept the will of the Belizean people. I thank all the candidates from both sides and it was a good fright and certainly from our side we are happy with the results we see we are moving in the right direction and we have quadrupled the number of councilors we have. We tripled the amount of councilors that we are now managing and we won the crown jewel, Belize City so I want to thank everyone that came out to vote, thank you very much."
Rt. Hon. Dean Barrow, Prime Minster
"I want associate myself with the first with the first portion of the remarks made by the leader of the opposition, join him in saluting and congratulating all Belizean women on international Women's day, I also well am touched by his kind words about my wife and I am happy in that portion of your remarks you mentioned your own mother. Both of us know what it is to have to see your loved one go through those circumstances all in order to make his point as to the strength and resilience of our Belizean women so very well said sir and happy to endorse all of that. Also the first part of the second part of the remarks, I join you in congratulating all Belizeans on the elections of Wednesday which you said were fiercely contested but with all peaceful. I also join you in congratulating apart from the voters all the candidates on both sides of the political divide. But I am agreeing too much with you so, I have to find something to disagree with you, I don't even quite disagree with you but your point about your progress, the progress of your party, indeed it was progress and I congratulate you for that but I like how you put it, you quadruple , boy when you are starting from such a low point, when you set the bar so low it is no hard to do you know so while any progress on your part is to be complimented and I sincerely do so, don't spin the thing like you have made these dramatic strides."
"No matter how you prettify the thing, no matter how you slant the thing the bare numbers and statistics don't lie, we won two thirds of the municipalities that were in play."
"So congratulations to you and your side sir but bigger congratulations on this side...thank you."
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