7 News Belize

Restore Belize Streamlining All Anti-crime Initiatives
posted (February 18, 2020)

As viewers are aware, crime continues to be a major challenge for successive government administrations to address in a meaningful way. Last year’s murder rate caused Belize be ranked as the 6th deadliest country in Latin American and the Caribbean.

But, things go in cycles.  You’ll have noticed the over the years, violent crime spikes. Then, there is a period of uneasy calm, before the nation is jolted back to reality with yet another crime wave.  And no matter which color is at the helm in Belmopan, they are only able to take short-term measures against this complex problem. 

So, are there lasting solutions that can address the root causes of violent crime instead of the symptoms? That’s what the folks at Restore Belize have been exploring over the last few months.  In consultation with the general public, they’ve put together a draft National Citizen Security Policy and Plan. 

This policy seeks to streamline all of the anti-crime initiatives that the different government agencies are engaged in, to ensure that there is no duplication of effort, while also ensuring that one anti-crime initiative isn’t undercutting the success of another. The draft policy also has new perspectives and techniques that Restore Belize is hoping will bring measurable success in crime reduction. They hosted a breakfast session with the media this morning to introduce the policy. Here’s what the Director told us about the draft document:

Mary Vasquez - Director, Restore Belize
"The draft National Citizen Security Policy and Plan were done in consultation with a broad group of stakeholders, including civil society, the Opposition, various government agencies that are key in citizen security actions. So, it’s a composite work. Our job was to pull together everything, so it represents all of that. It also represents the plans and the programs that have well-designed, and that are being implemented by various government agencies, and civil society partners. It’s at its penultimate phase before final, because we’ve put together everything and right now, what we’re doing is we’re bringing it back to the stakeholder groups that made their input. SO, this is the final stage where we’re saying, okay, this is what we heard from you, and then after that, we can consider it final. The plan actually is a blueprint, a road map for how we can take what we’re doing and increase the impact of it. So, we have two pathways in the plan. The first pathway is, what programs are the most essential for achieving citizen security."

"We’re talking about everything that contributes from birth to the nurturing and molding of law-abiding and productive citizens. So, we focused on all those programs from childhood through to adulthood, but then, we also focused on pathway 2, which is about behaviour. It’s about behaviour in decision making, behaviour about how we are governed. It’s about behaviour in how we provide services, as duty-bearers, decision-makers, and resource managers. We’ve introduced additional theoretical frameworks that are accepted in discussions about violent crime, as part of the solution. So, we talk about the need for trauma-informed care, for understanding the role of trauma in violence, and the need to heal trauma to heal and change a violent society. We’re also introducing the complex problems, and that has an implication for how we make decisions, and what it’s saying is that we need to be much more flexible about how we make decisions, and we need to be much more responsive to the dynamics of the situation of violence, crime, and poverty."

As you heard, Restore Belize will now present the draft policy and plan to the stakeholders they consulted with, to get their final input.

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