2025 Election Delays Progress on Maya Land Consult Order

This week, the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) held a virtual hearing with the Government of Belize and the Maya Leaders Alliance to check in on the progress of the Maya Land Rights Consent Order. This order, agreed upon in 2015, aims to recognize the land rights of the indigenous Maya people. Lead government attorney Andrew Marshalleck provided an update on how things have been moving forward since the last hearing in late January.

 

Andrew Marshalleck, Lead Government Attorney

“The National Assembly was dissolved on the eleventh February, just days after the draft was presented to the Cabinet subcommittee. The result is that they have not looked at it and have not reverted. The general elections were held on on March twelfth, and on March seventeeth, a new minister responsible for Indigenous Peoples Affairs was appointed. I managed to meet with him on Friday and briefed him as to where we are. He brings a new perspective and new energy to the effort. But he reminded me, and he’s right, that having been previously a minister of state that he was not in cabinet when all the briefings surrounding this issue were presented to that body.  So we’ve had to start process of bringing him up to speed on everything. And we hope to accomplish that this week. The ministry is still without a Chief Executive Officer, but we expect one to be appointed. Shortly, our points of contact haven’t yet been completely established. The previous chief executive officer has been accommodating on a request to put us in touch with the new minister, but that is transitional. The three deliverables remain deliverables is the long and short of that.  We will have to try to get those papers before what I expect will possibly be a new cabinet subcommittee as soon as we’re able to. And the next step is, remains, the next steps remain the same, but the elections have intervened and have caused delays.”