Unpaid Land Taxes Could Result in Seizure
Just now you heard the Prime Minister discuss the three primary unpaid taxes that collectors will be going after – but added to these are people who owe back taxes on their land. According to Briceño, G.O.B. will confiscate land if necessary.
Prime Minister John Briceño
“As the honorable member of Lake I has said, there are tens of millions of dollars land tax arrears and under the tax recovery unit we are going to pursue a recovery of these taxes because we recognize land tax represents a first lead under tax and if it isn’t paid then such land may be sold for recovery of outstanding taxes. As the minister just pointed out to me, land tax isn’t like the others of six years but it is twelve years so we have enough time to go after these owners of land who haven’t been paying their taxes. From our end it is easy to settle when it comes to land tax because if you nuh wah pay the tax give we the land so that we could pass these lands to the Belizean people. And we calling out these huge land owners, many of whom don’t live in Belize and probably don’t know here the land is in Belize. So we wah tell deh pay the taxes or we wah use those of what you owe we so that we get back some of that land.”