Cabinet Ministers Flyover Chiquibul

According to Manzanero, two Cabinet ministers participated in a flyover of the Chiquibul Forest.  Minister of Defence and Border Security, Florencio Marin Junior, and Minister of Sustainable Development, Orlando Habet, saw firsthand the devastation happening in the Chiquibul. Manzanero hopes that with this information, the government can act more appropriately.

 

Rafael Manzanero, Executive Director, F.C.D.

“We had the opportunity of taking the Minister of Sustainable Development Honorable Habet and also Honorable Marin from Border Security, we had the opportunity of playing them over the area of Chiquibul and Columbia River. And so they do have the firsthand information in terms of what is happening along that area, which you know, for me, I would just hope then that by themselves seeing it firsthand, they certainly do know the gravity and the magnitude of these problems. And that it really should be, you know, of course, at the governmental level, really to address, you know, these boundary issues. We have noticed that it does take that footwork’s, it does take the patrols, it does take to have a presence in the area. For But it needs to have a presence that is,  and the key word is a person that is assertive. That is important because you can have men there, but if you are not really assertive, then you’re still cannot really be able to do the work. So, my feeling is that in the Columbia River, it has to be boosted up with that assertive move. We have documented from early this year that Columbia River really has a lot of other issues beyond the Chiquibul. So we feel that there is now a movement of more people, human footprint. Expansion in the Columbia River Forest Reserve and frankly, by seeing the kind of the bridges, that means that they have really felt a level of comfort. They have felt a level of confidence that they can be able to do an extraction of timber in truckloads from that area there.”