Will The Public Ever See Senate Special Select Support? |
Tue, March 18, 2025 |
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During the last term of the house, Chanona also served as the chairlady for the Senate Special Select Committee which launched a probe into the genesis and adoption of the Portico Definitive Agreement.
But, the committee never got to table its final report in the upper house - because in February the President said it could expose government to liability.
So what's going to happen to the taxpayer funded report? And should it be made available to the public? Chanona discussed what's at stake:
Janelle Chanona, Chairlady, Senate Special Select Committee
"Well I think it flags to the wider community a couple things I think parliamentary wise from that angle that those areas of the standing orders and the parliamentary rules that we need to look at to make sure that we can be accountable in terms of all committees being able to carry forward with that work. We were certainly very committed to completing our task. It was out of our hands when the parliamentary session would end but once we learned about that we would go through every challenge, every hurdle every obstacle to our preferred timeline and then making sure in the end that we were committed to delivering on that report. I can't speak to what happened in terms of the rationale over and beyond what's already been shared publicly. But it's really about making sure that the Belizean people know that we completed our task and I think it is showing the importance of having these exercises more regularly so that we can see the gaps and address those gaps but also I think it highlights that there is much to be desired in terms of as public officials who are collecting a pension and who are, you know, putting themselves up for leadership that there is a legit expectation, first for it to be reciprocated when their questions are asked. We spent the morning talking about you know how do we ensure transparency and how do we help to ensure accountability and we think how it plays out that Belizean people on a while need to signal very clearly what changes that this experience has highlighted that needs to shift to make sure that this is the last time there is an opportunity to do that."
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