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Last night we told you about the Guatemalan Bus that appeared this week at the Belize City bus terminal on West Collet Canal.  It's caused an uproar amongst local bus operators who say that Transport Minister Edmond Castro is actively undermining them and giving the upper hand to Guatemalan bus operators.  But Castro said he didn't authorize the yellow bus we saw pictures of.  But, he did.  This letter to Transport Commissioner Tirso Galvez gives the green light to the yellow bus.  

On March 5th, Castro gave the San Juan Travel Bus Corporation permission to load and offload passengers at the Belize City terminal for two runs daily.  Now, the condition is that the bus cannot pick up commuters traveling within Belize.

The bus is supposed to travel to Flores, Tikal, Antigua and Guatemala City and only carry passengers on those direct routes.

Still, Belize's bus operators are not happy because their buses can't even go into Melchor - and that includes the high ride air conditioned busses.  

They say its unfair and yesterday Belize Bus Association member Darren Stuart demanded to see the Mundo Maya agreement which permits this...

Darren Stuart - Stuart’s Bus
"If the agreement was made between the Mundo Mayan countries in the past, we want to see a copy of that letter. We need to see a copy of that agreement, reason being, is because the ADO bus coming from Guatemala, the Fuente Del Norte, the Linea Dorado all these buses coming from Guatemala and no Belize bus cannot go and traverse within those other countries.  So we feel like we are getting the shitty end of the stick. We want to see what that agreement entail and we need to revisit that agreement and I'm calling on the person responsible whether it's from the department of tourism or the transport department. Get the letter to the BBA or different things is going to happen that we don’t want to happen. that’s not a warning, that’s an advice.â€￾ 

The operators say they will continue to agitate for equal treatment in Guatemala and Mexico.

The Guatemalan bus runs are supposedly to benefit persons seeking treatment in Guatemala and students studying there.