October, 2024 - Channel 5 Belize

Widespread Bribery Among B.D.F. Soldiers?

The Belize Defence Force (B.D.F.) continues to investigate allegations of bribery among soldiers. That investigation was launched after this station produced an investigative piece earlier this month. In that piece, Digital Editor Hipolito Novelo revealed allegations that B.D.F. soldiers stationed at the Machakilha Conservation Post along the Belize/Guatemala border were accepting bribes by Guatemalans. These bribes came in different forms, including cash, canned food, and chicken. The soldiers take these bribes and turn a blind eye to Guatemalan loggers who continue to operate within Belize. Allegations of Guatemalan bribes date back several years, with one logger claiming to have been bribing soldiers for over five years. These allegations not only raise questions about discipline but also about the overall support and infrastructure provided to Belizean soldiers patrolling the contested southern border. Now, if the allegations prove to be true, as we suspect they are, it will have serious ramifications on Belize’s national defence and security. Our investigation has revealed that the B.D.F. high command is not only investigating soldiers stationed at Machakilha but at all CPs. So today, we asked the B.D.F.’s Chief of Staff, Roberta Usher, if there is a possibility that bribery occurs at all CPs. Here is how she responded.

Major Roberta Usher, Chief of Staff, B.D.F.

“Those are two separate incidents that we’re investigating and that that continues to be investigated at all the CPS, whether or soldiers are not being truthful and bribing is occurring. Those are those are 2 separate matters. The escalation on the hostility of encircling a CP is 1 matter and disciplinary procedures as to our protocols, whether releasing them or not was suitable and feasible at the time versus what higher command thinks was acceptable. And then the bribing is another investigation that I have no other information to explain to you until that is concluded from all the CPS throughout our borders.”

Hipolito Novelo

“So the allegations extends not only to Machakilha but other CPs along the borders in terms of allegations of bribery.”

Major Roberta Usher

“Well, when we receive allegations and accusations of things like that, yes, we check all our CPs as to what is occurring because we need to know what is occurring along the border. Not just necessarily one conservation, one observation post, but all of them because the integrity of the force is then questioned.”

Hipolito Novelo

“I’m trying to establish that there is the possibility that bribery is not only occurring at Machakilha, that the possibility is that it is occurring in other CPs along the border.”

Major Roberta Usher

“Well, we are ensuring that that is not the case by conducting investigations at all. Yes.”

Hipolito Novelo

“The possibility still exists.”

Major Roberta Usher

“Possibilities exist throughout, but now we are ensuring that it is not y conducting our own internal investigations throughout our CPS across the border.”

B.D.F. Doesn’t Have Device to Track Soldiers in Realtime

Reports that soldiers are being offered bribes as low as chicken sparked public debate about the challenging conditions faced by those patrolling Belize’s remote borders. When we asked the Prime Minister about it, he said that such incidents can occur anywhere. Given that entry-level soldiers earn just forty dollars a day and endure challenging conditions, this situation raises significant concerns about their morale and the adequacy of support they receive. The Prime Minister mentioned that technological upgrades, such as tracking devices, are being implemented to ensure soldiers remain on Belizean soil during patrols, and better communication tools may be necessary for future missions. He said “We’re using the tracking system so that we know where they are at all times.” Immediately after the Prime Minister’s comments were published, highly placed sources in the B.D.F. told News Five that perhaps the Prime Minister misspoke because the force does not have any device that can track soldiers in real time. So we asked Major Usher about it.

Major Roberta Usher, Chief of Staff, B.D.F.

“Like I had told you before, we are looking into the ventures of technologies. And we have, we have the capability of communicating with our soldiers. Yes.”

Hipolito Novelo

“That’s a very long no major. So no tracking devices.”

Major Roberta Usher

“We have the ability to communicate with our soldiers or looking into other technological ventures to see how we can best remain in communication and tracking our soldiers on the borders. Yes.”

B.D.F. Chief of Staff says Guatemalans Weren’t Hostile

In our investigation, we revealed that on September seventh, B.D.F. troops apprehended Guatemalan loggers operating illegally in the Columbia River Forest Reserve. However, their position was quickly compromised when over ten armed Guatemalans surrounded them. Communication with Fairweather Camp was lost, gunshots were fired, and outnumbered soldiers had no choice but to release their detainees to avoid escalation. An investigation into that matter was launched after this station reported the alarming details. The investigation was completed last week, and we asked Major Usher for an update.

Major Roberta Usher, Chief of Staff, B.D.F.

“So the investigation has confirmed that they indeed were surrounded. However, hostility did not escalate as we had previously discussed. They were they came over to see the five detainees as to why they were detained, and they did encircle the CP at the time the commander saw it feasible and appropriate to release the detainees. Due to his own, I guess measurements that he did not want the situation to escalate, whether it would have or not, we won’t know.

Hipolito Novelo

“Are you able to say if the Guatemalans who had circled the CP were indeed armed? The report says at least two shots were heard.”

Major Roberta Usher

“So our investigations do not line up with that in the fact, yes, what you explained is that you heard that shots were being fired, et cetera. What we came up the conclusion of the investigation that was not case.”

Hipolito Novelo

“Is this something normally that happens that if there is a situation that might escalate to possibly a shootout or a showdown that the patrol commander or the CP commander would then take it upon himself to decide to release illegal Guatemalans who had continuously deforested Belizean land?

Major Roberta Usher

“No. So I will not disclose our procedures for our operation for operational security. However, we have protocols in the event of escalation on what measures are to be taken. And the commander on the ground took the measure. He saw fit for this situation. Yes.”

Hipolito Novelo

“Would you classify this as appropriate measures?

Major Roberta Usher

“Again. This is appropriate to him on the ground. In, his time that he saw this at the most suitable to release them in the event of escalation. Yes.”

Hipolito Novelo

“I’m trying to establish whether, whether or not the BDF high command agrees that these illegal Guatemalans on Belizean land were to be released.”

Major Roberta Usher

“No, they, they were not to be released. The procedures are that the police will bring them in to detain them? There were no police at Machakilha at the time, and the powers that be, the commander on the ground saw it fit to release them.”

Culvert Breaks, Ground Collapses Beside House with Family Inside

A family from San Ignacio Town is lucky that their house did not collapse when recent rains caused a culvert to break next to their yard, pulling down the cement fence that held the ground together and creating a huge hole next to a house. It is believed that the two-story structure on Flamingo Avenue held up only because of the steel enforcements that it was built with. When News Five showed up at the site on Wednesday, employees of the Ministry of Infrastructure Development and Housing along with those from the San Ignacio/Santa Elena Town Board were there spreading rocks in the crater that was created when the ground broke loose. News Five’s Marion Ali filed this report.

Marion Ali, Reporting
Nora Gomez was at home with her family a week ago when heavy rains caused the ground adjacent to their house in San Ignacio to become loose and cave in. It happened when a culvert that runs adjacent to their house broke and took with it the portion of the ground, creating a huge crater and exposing the posts of the cement house they live in. Gomez told News 5 that she and her family were inside when all she heard was a loud bang.

Nora Gomez, Occupant of House
“Every time it rains, the mud starts collapsing and that’s when the big wall that was sustaining the poster where the septic is dropped.”

Marion Ali

“What did it sound like? Were you scared?”

Nora Gomez

“Boom! Like, boom! The whole wall – when he went out, the wall dropped. That was the wall, the whole long wall that was sustaining it dropped, so, it’s something dangerous to have three kids and every time they go to the bathroom, it’s something you have to be right there with them. So, it’s something so dangerous for not only me, but my neighbors.”

Gomez says the problem had been giving them signs since before the last set of rains fell.

Nora Gomez

“When we came to live here my landlord said that it’s something, whenever it rains, it’s something, every time, little by little, the mud start dropping.”

On Wednesday, workmen from the San Ignacio Town Council were piling rocks to fill the hole. Thereafter, the plan is to rebuild the wall that secured the property from the culvert. San Ignacio/Santa Elena Mayor Earl Trapp told News Five that the Ministry of Infrastructure Development and Housing provided the aggregates.

Earl Trapp, Mayor, San Ignacio/Santa Elena Town Council

“A creek has been washing away the foundation and base of residences and fence around that area, so it has basically compromised the integrity of that structure – the one, a house on Flamingo [Avenue]. So, currently we are working on trying to restore that with some big rocks at the moment.”

Nora Gomez

“With that wall they are fixing, it should sustain the mud and the post there.”

Marion Ali for News Five.

Paying the Bills of Dumpster Living

Some of us either work for a company or we own one and employ others to work for us. Others simply work for themselves, surviving off a craft, service or talent. But there are those who do very humbling jobs, the kinds that put our safety at risk, like cleaning the streets and draining or collecting the garbage. And then there are the very few who pay their bills off rummaging through the garbage looking for recyclables they can sell to earn a living. We call them scavengers, but whatever we refer to them as, we spoke to a few of them today who say they rather do that than to engage in a life of crime in order to live. News Five brings you this week’s edition of Belize on Reel on dumpster living.

Marion Ali, Reporting

It was Scotsman Hector Urkuhart who wrote the popular English proverb: One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. This saying holds true for the people who rely on the bags of garbage we dispose of to earn an honest living to buy their meals and pay their bills.

Patricia Robateau, Trash Scavenger

“We gather aluminum, copper, bronze, plastic, Bowen & Bowen pints, tin.”

Marion Ali

“All these things are sold where, the metals?”

Patricia Robateau

“Well, we have buyers and we have our recycling shop.”

Earl Trapp is the mayor of San Ignacio and Santa Elena. He says that people oftentimes throw away items that only need minor repair, and the discards come as great finds for the scavengers.

Earl Trapp, Mayor, San Ignacio/Santa Elena

“You could see people walking out with many fans many times. Sometimes it’s just one basic capacitor or one wire is broken, and it works. People have really been using this place as something to make a living from. People have used this place to send children to school, high school, sixth form, so, I know of some families that have picked up bottles on the roadside and sent their children to school with that.”

Patricia Robateau is a garbage scavenger who visits the Belize Waste Control transfer station at mile two on the George Price Highway in Belize City. She says that she lives off the trash that we throw away. Sometimes the job comes easy, she says, depending on what we pack them in.

Patricia Robateau

“Some of the bags are transparent and we can see through the bags and automatically we just grab the bag that we see the certain stuff that we want because the black bag, we have to open it and check it.”

For Robateau and her colleagues, Robert McKoy and Sidney Forbes, helping to control the garbage situation by recycling material that is thrown away is one part of what they do. There is the noble aspect of rummaging through our waste to earn a living.

Patricia Robateau

“It’s an honest way of making a living and it’s not very hard and you can take time off and go do extra stuff on the side. When you have a permanent job, you don’t even have time for yourself.”

Marion Ali

“This is your job. You work for yourself.”

Patricia Robateau

“Yes, self-employed.”

Robert McKoy, Trash Scavenger

“Everyday I fill my belly and I stay out of crime. I’m a gelly old all man. This place keep it just like I come from Brodies. The best things come to this place.

Marion Ali

“Okay, but you have to go through a lot of digging in garbage, so it’s not sanitary.”

Robert McKoy

“I’m the energizer, so digging doesn’t worry me. I come to dig and I come to sort, I come to seek and I will find.”

But the job is perhaps one of the most hazardous and unsanitary that exists because everything that is dumped from every sector of the community finds its way to the transfer station. Robateau says they have to gear down to face the filth.

Patricia Robateau

“I just use this because there’s certain things in the dirt, it make you feel bad, and bacteria is in the dirt. So I wear my mask every time. Some of us wear masks. We wear gloves, then we wear a vest. This is not a company vest.”

Marion Ali

“What about your feet?”

Patricia Robateau

“And then we wear our boots, like one of those boots that the guys have on. And that is a complete dress with long pants and a T-shirt.”

The only upside to the job is the lucky find, that is, wallets containing money, jewellery, and other valuables that people discard by mistake. Once Mayor Trapp said he got a frantic call from a resident who needed to track down a valuable piece of jewellery.

Earl Trapp

“About six weeks ago. A young lady went to the garage. She was very concerned. She was crying, um, that the garbage truck picked up garbage from outside her house.”

Marion Ali

“She threw away what?”

Earl Trapp

“A piece of jewelry. I’m not sure if she found it, but I think the guy reached on time before the tractor was able to unload and I think she may have retrieved what she had thrown away.”

Robert McKoy

“People just throw away the wrong thing sometimes. Sometimes people throw away the wrong bag. And when they come to me, I have a clean heart. If they throw away the wrong bag and they cry to me, I don’t need no money. Hold the items.”

Sidney Forbes, Trash Scavenger

“We find silver, gold, we find many things. We find even money. We come up, yoh call it come up.”

Marion Ali for News Five.

P.U.P. Chairman Comments on UDP’s Messy Infighting

This morning, two conflicting press releases emerged under the United Democratic Party (U.D.P.) banner, one from Moses “Shyne” Barrow and the other from Tracy Taegar-Panton. Both figures rejected each other’s involvement in the party. Barrow insisted that Sunday’s convention was illegitimate and not officially linked to the U.D.P., while Panton dismissed Barrow’s leadership and criticism. As this internal dispute intensifies, questions are being raised about the opposition’s ability to effectively hold the government accountable. The P.U.P.’s Chairman, Henry Charles Usher, was asked to weigh in on the situation.

Henry Charles Usher, Chairman, P.U.P.

“I think looking at it from a governance perspective, it is unfortunate the way the opposition can’t seem to get their act together, the infighting that they’re having because They are part of the government. They are elected by the people they serve in the National Assembly. We’ve been arguing about this, or making a mention of it to the Speaker that you have a member of the opposition that has not appeared in the House of Representatives except for that first initial time and probably stayed for thirty minutes. That is a good governance issue. You are elected by the people to do a job and you just refuse to show up to do your job. So that is something. The motion last week to remove opposition members from House committees, making it almost impossible that the opposition will be able to be a part of all of these House committees. I think on Wednesday, yesterday, there were like six House committees. I’m not sure how many of them the opposition attended.”

ComPol Says Police Won’t Get in UDP “Love Affair”

On Sunday, the police were called out to the U.D.P. headquarters on Youth for the Future Drive when U.D.P. loyalist Brian “Yellow Man” Audinett allegedly hurled threats at the Leader of the Opposition, Moses “Shyne Barrow. The locks were reportedly changed on all the doors outside and inside the building to keep members of the Alliance for Democracy from claiming rights to the building. Today Commissioner of Police Chester Williams told reporters that he instructed the officers to stand down, as the police will not be used as pawns in the ongoings of the U.D.P. once it does not involve a crime.

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“I had recalled the police from there. I said to them, I don’t want the police to be involved in the love affairs of the UDP. We’re not going to be used as a pawn by either side. That’s an entanglement that they are in, and they must find a way to solve that. If it is that there is a threat of damage to property or a threat to life, then the police is going to respond. But in the absence of that to be manning the UDP headquarters or the likes, the police is not going to do that. no.”

ComPol Says “Shyne” Needs to File a Report

Leader of the Opposition, Moses “Shyne” Barrow, has laid the matter at the feet of the police, saying that he feels that even if he filed a report against Audinett, he feels that it would be an exercise in futility since the police had not acted upon a previous report that he had made against Beverly Williams. Today ComPol Chester Williams responded to that comment and said that if Barrow wants the police to act, he needs to file a report.

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“When you speak of the Leader of the Opposition, I would have to know which one of them you’re speaking about. I don’t know. I know there is – from what I’m told, there are two. I don’t know which of them you’re speaking of, so I can’t answer.”

Reporter

“Mr. Barrow, Sir.”

Chester Williams

“Oh, Mr Barrow, okay (laughter) – I had said to Shyne, the matter that he had reported in respect to Beverly Williams is one which is a class complaint. If Beverly is arrested then he needs to be arrested too. She also made a report against him. If it is that they wish to go to court and resolve the issue, then we have no issue doing that. In terms of the issue with Yellow Man, I’m not fully aware of the nature of that complaint. I have not seen it, so I cannot comment on that.”

Reporter

“No, he said he doesn’t want to make a complaint because he feels it might be futile and it should be up to the police to look into it, given that there’s a video online.”

Chester Williams

“No, no, it’s not up to the police. If a person made a threat against you, it’s your prerogative to come to the police and make a report. The police will not act if you don’t come to the police and give a report.”

Minister Usher Responds to PCC Critics: They Should Have Attended Consultations

The People’s Constitution Commission (PCC) has concluded its public consultations for Belize’s constitutional reform. This marks a significant step toward making recommendations for change. Early in the process, political scientists Doctor Harold Young and Doctor Dylan Vernon were brought in as consultants, but both eventually distanced themselves from the project. Doctor Young later voiced public concerns, questioning the PCC’s ability to truly represent the people’s views in their recommendations. When asked about this, Minister of Constitutional Reform, Henry Charles Usher, responded, suggesting that critics like Doctor Young should have participated in the consultations instead of criticising from the sidelines.

Henry Charles Usher, Minister of Constitutional & Political Reform

“I understand that Dr. Young was making some criticisms and that’s, that’s fine for him to make what he should have done if he felt that he had input or he had points to make was go to some of the consultations and raise those points at that, at those consultations. Mr. Dylan Vernon, who was also part of the commission, he was not let go by the way. He stepped out, he has written articles. He has written opinions that have been sent to the PCC. He has attended some of the consultation processes. So, I’m not sure if Dr. Young did the same. But any criticism that is now coming, my answer to them is, they should have gone to the consultation. It happened for over a year in different parts of the country.”

Minister Usher Says PCC Report is Right on Track

The People’s Constitution Commission (PCC) is set to submit its final report with recommendations for constitutional reform by mid-November. The report, crafted by a diverse set of stakeholders, is based on a series of public consultations held across the country. However, the commission faced several hurdles during the process, including internal conflicts, time constraints, and financial shortages. News Five spoke with Minister of Constitutional Reform, Henry Charles Usher, to find out how these challenges impacted the commission’s work and the quality of its final recommendations.

Henry Charles Usher, Minister of Constitutional & Political Reform

“The budget that they had presented was the budget that was approved, so I’m not sure where you got that information from they had requested an extension, the initial legislation, or the legislation called for a period of eighteen months, starting from November of 2022, so it should have been completed March of 2024, but they did request an extension to the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister granted that extension up until November of 2024, in terms of additional budget, they did request an additional budget for that extension and that was also approved. I believe that they’re wrapping up now. I think the next step is for a draft to go to the stakeholders, as you would recall, there are twenty-three or so stakeholders that make up the commission. So now that they have consulted with the Belizean people, they have put all of that in summary form. It now goes back to the stakeholders for their input, and then we expect a final report very soon.”