So where does Freetown Area Representative Francis Fonseca, an avid supporter of Vaughn, stand in all of this? This morning, Fonseca told News Five that while he stands behind Vaughn’s appointment, he had nothing to do with the process of selecting the city administrator.
Francis Fonseca, Area Representative, Freetown
“Obviously, I support Albert, but I should make it very clear, you know, as I’ve said, anybody who knows Albert Vaughn knows that he is his own man, he makes his own decisions. So I did not encourage Albert to apply for the post of city administrator; in fact, selfishly I would have preferred for him to remain on the ground with me in Freetown and continue to support the work that we do here at NICH, as a member of the board. So, but you know, he made that decision to apply and out of respect for him, I certainly support that decision. So, you know, that’s my position.”
Isani Cayetano
“What do you make of the internal row, the controversy within the Belize City Council, as far as his appointment and what seems to be, from their perspective, some kind of a unilateral decision taken to put him in that office?”
Francis Fonseca
“Yeah, I really, to be very honest with you, I am so busy that I have not been following the internal workings of the Belize City Council. I know that our team in Freetown worked very hard to get all of them elected, so it’s very disappointing to see this kind of division emerging. I don’t know where it’s coming from and what the objective is. I think all of them know Albert Vaughn and they know that he is a good man who works very hard and is committed to Belize City. So it’s disappointing, but I am sure they have their own reasons and I am sure it will resolve itself, you know, hopefully amicably, so that we can get on with the real business of the people. The residents of Belize City want to have a city council that is working for them and that’s what’s most important.”
The Belize City Council, under the leadership of Mayor Bernard Wagner, has commenced a third consecutive term and, despite the quarrel over a city administrator, has hit the ground running. It’s been a little over five weeks since the People’s United Party municipal government took office and, according to Mayor Wagner, the team has been working diligently to ensure all vacancies are filled.
Bernard Wagner, Belize City Mayor
“It’s simply has been work, work, work, trying to get our team back in place. As you know, the untimely passing of our city administrator, we have to ensure that we have to get our finance director in place. We have to ensure that we get our internal auditor in place, we have to ensure that we get all the other vacancies filled. It’s only so when you have those vacancies filler that you are able to really drive change and drive development in your city. Once we get those vacancies filled and we are certain of the plan on how we go about that, then we will not have any issue, no issue at all. I am confident that come, at our caucus our councilors will ensure that we get the job of the people done.”
It is not over for former Port Loyola Area Representative Anthony “Boot’s Martinez and his petition to recall current Area Representative Gilroy Usher. On Monday, we told you that his petition attempt was unsuccessful. In a letter to Martinez from the Office of the Governor General, he was informed that the accepted number of signatures did not meet the requisite thirty percent of registered electors in Port Loyola. He submitted one thousand, six hundred and fifty-four signatures. Only one thousand three hundred and eighty-nine were approved. That is ninety-six signatures shy of the number of approved signatures Martinez needed. In total, two hundred and sixty-five signatures were rejected. Today, Martinez called a press conference to announce that he has sought the legal counsel from attorney Richard ‘Dickie’ Bradley, as he seeks to challenge the Election and Boundaries Department’s verification process of more than one hundred of those signatures.
Anthony “Boots” Martinez
Anthony “Boots” Martinez, Former Area Rep., Port Loyola
“What we did, after I received the letter from the governor general and especially the portion that relates to one hundred and eighty-eight signatures did not match with the election records that they have. I set out to consult with the attorneys and see what remedy can be done to that. And part of it I was very offended, because in my humble opinion, elections and boundaries and the chief elections officer, Ms. Tamai, in my view made a gross error by not verifying the signatures. Verify means verify and in my view the chief elections officer and the elections and boundaries department have the resources, human and otherwise to verify simple things, when you register or transfer you stand against a wall, take a picture, they ask you where you live, direction where to get there, your house, who is your neighbor, all kind of question. Elections and Boundaries was task with one simple task, go and find out, call, you are registered voter in Port Loyola, did you sign a recall petition. That is verification if you have doubts. Now I am not saying the election records wouldn’t help, but where there is doubt you must verify.”
According to Martinez, this morning he delivered packages to Chief Elections Officer Josephine Tamai, the Office of the Governor General, and the Office of the Attorney General. Martinez says that he has acquired an affidavit from one hundred and eighteen individuals whose signatures were rejected. He says that those declarations were placed in the packages, along with the letter from his attorney.
Anthony “Boots” Martinez, Former Area Rep., Port Loyola
“We undertook to start to revisit, I revisited along with the justice of the peace, various of them to present my copy of the petition, attach to the affidavit, affirming, do you recognize this signature? Yes sir, did you sign? Yes sir, and then I would like you to read the declaration and sign that you did sign the petition and that is what happened. So, this morning we delivered a list, apart from the letter from the attorney, a list to the chief elections and boundaries officer, a list of a hundred and eighteen people who have signed the declaration stating they signed the petition. What we have along with the declaration is a copy of people valid ID. All we the say, we might nuh need fih waste the court time, do your job and we don’t need to waste the court time. In life, all of us err and we are not too big to say we err on this one. I saw this morning when I went to Belmopan to the Chief Elections and Boundaries Officer office I saw the sign, enhancing democracy, to me that is disenfranchising people in terms of democracy. I am sorry, I will not let this go.”
The Belize City Civic Center will come alive on Sunday evening for the Belize Elite Basketball League’s All-Star game. It promises to be a fun-filled family event with loads of giveaways. A group of twenty-four players from the ninety athletes currently playing in the league were selected through a voting process. According to the league’s Commissioner, Glenn Gill, the voting process included team owners, managers, head coaches, media representatives and desk officials. This morning, Commissioner Gill and the team owners called a press conference to explain the approach and invited fans to the game.
Glenn Gill
Glenn Gill, Commissioner, BEBL
“Each team had to put two foreigners, three Belizeans and three Belizean Americans from off their teams. In some cases, some teams didn’t have Belizean American but after doing that, we looked at stats and twenty-four players were selected. From those twenty-four players, the owners, the coaches, assistant coaches, the commissioner and deputy commissioner and the media voted for the players who would participate in the games. It was forty-eight and it came down to twenty-four. The list was made and from that the public will decide who will start the game. Now for the all-star game, the prize money will be three thousand or ten percent of what the gate makes, depending on which one is greater. So, one team will be called the home team and the other will be called the away team. One of the rules will be that there will be three foreigners on each team and only two of them can play at any one time. As I said, the home team will be basically players and the away team will be Belizean Americans with the three foreigners.”
The weekend will also include a three-point shootout and a slam dunk contest.
Since releasing the 2024 all-star roster, the B.E.B.L. has received both praise and criticism from fans. There are those who are of the view that several high performing players did not make it unto the roster. It is a debate that takes place in leagues across the world, including the N.B.A. And today, Gilbert Gordon, the Chief Executive Officer of the Benny’s Belize Hurricanes, addressed the concerns of fans.
Gilbert Gordon
Gilbert Gordon, C.E.O, Benny’s Belize Hurricanes
“Statistics is one thing when it comes to the all-star and if you want to look at the NBA, although you might be the leading scorer you still need to go through a voting process, and it does not require that you are going to be an all-star. They have their voting process, their fans and the entities that vote for it. The all-star is for the media, the coaches, the fans to vote. There are different models we can use, and we can look and see how we can grow from it. This year we introduced this model. This style in respect to how we want to introduce the all-star, whereby we are saying we will have the fans vote for the starting five, but we have these entities that will be voting for the players. All-star have always been about popularity and even in the NBA you get all-star snubs, people that everybody believe that should be an all-star. And not everybody is going to be happy with the process. We are looking at what people are saying and if it is constructive we are going to use it at next year’s all-star in order for us to grow.”
Foreign Minister Francis Fonseca recently led a delegation of ambassadors, as well as other members of the diplomatic community, to the Sarstoon River, the southernmost point on the map of Belize. The visit precedes the official launch of a forward operating base that has been reconstructed at the estuary. He told us more about the visit.
Francis Fonseca
Francis Fonseca, Minister of Foreign Affairs
“I thought it was very important. We had all of our heads of mission in Belize, we have our annual heads of mission encounter. So we had all of our ambassadors in Belize and we thought it was a very useful opportunity to take them out to the Sarstoon, to the forward operating base, to see for themselves. You know, they very often talk about this at conferences and in meetings, but a few of them have never been out there. So we thought that it was important for them to see firsthand what we are talking about, what we are defending when we talk about territorial integrity, national sovereignty and to have them meet and engage with the soldiers out there, the BDF soldiers who are manning the forward operating base and to meet our coast guard officials as well. So, you know, I was out there recently, along with the Minister of Border Security Florencio Marin. He and I were out there and we opened the forward operating base, it’s been nicely refurbished. So we wanted them to have that experience and they all thoroughly enjoyed it and said it meant a lot to them to have that opportunity because now they can speak about it with a lot more confidence and a lot more, you know, passion because they, themselves, have experienced the Sarstoon.”
The Ministry of Health, in collaboration with PAHO, is implementing new tactics in Belize’s healthcare sector to combat cardiovascular diseases. The HEARTS initiative was introduced to Belize in November 2023, after it proved successful in other parts of the region. Today, key stakeholders in the healthcare sector across the region, and Belize, attended a workshop to learn how to implement the strategies in the HEARTS initiative into healthcare services. Here’s News Five’s Britney Gordon with more information.
Britney Gordon, reporting
Each year, cardiovascular diseases continue to be the leading cause of death globally. Roughly thirty-two percent of all deaths worldwide are caused by related illnesses with low-income countries such as Belize being highly susceptible to these diseases. Diet and lifestyle choices play a major part in the prevalence of these conditions and Belize has struggled to overcome these challenges year after year. To combat these statistics, The HEARTS initiative was introduced to Belize through PAHO, in collaboration with the Ministry of Health. The initiative was implemented locally, in the western region first and now in the central region. Today, members of the healthcare sector gathered to participate in a workshop that will guide them on how to use HEARTS strategies effectively. Doctor Fidel Cuellar, Deputy Director of Public Health and Wellness, explained what the HEART initiative encompasses.
Doctor Fidel Cuellar
Doctor Fidel Cuellar, Deputy Director, Public Health and Wellness
“What HEARTS is, it is a package, various packages that are geared towards addressing risk factors for the biggest reason of death, really, in the Caribbean and Belize, which is cardiovascular deaths. What we’re saying is that we understand that people are dying of hypertension related illnesses, like stroke, heart attack, chronic kidney diseases. HEARTS is going to help us to address this problem, to be able to control hypertension and diabetes the way it should be. Unfortunately, the majority of people who have hypertension, they do not have it properly controlled. And then that leads ultimately to your strokes and your heart attacks. And that is why HEARTS is very important for us in Belize.”
Cuellar acknowledged that cardiovascular diseases have continued to be the leading causes of death in the region, despite previous attempts to combat its prevalence. He explained that the HEARTS initiative is taking a dynamic approach across various aspects of the healthcare sector to combat the condition from several angles.
Doctor Fidel Cuellar
“So what hearts is doing is putting very clear, easy protocols in place so that the physicians and nurses and everybody can get on board. For example, right now in Belize. If you’re just diagnosed with hypertension, depending on which doctor you go to, you will have different medications. The hearts data shows that doesn’t work. You need to be on a specific set of medications for a specific set of time. And it needs to be adjusted in a specific way. So that, in itself, is a big difference. The other difference is the way we approach hypertension. Traditionally, we use manual cuffs, or we don’t use validated devices. And everybody does it their own way. Having people do it one specific way helps us to determine who is hypertensive and who isn’t. And if you’re hypertensive, what is your true number? So these are major changes in the way we approach hypertension and the way we treat it.”
The HEARTS Initiative was launched in 2016, by the World Health Organization and the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention with other partners to support governments in strengthening the prevention and control of cardiovascular diseases. Doctor Karen Lewis Bell, PAHO WHO Representative in Belize, explained how the initiative found its way to the country.
Doctor Karen Lewis Bell
Doctor Karen Lewis Bell, PAHO WHO Representative, Belize
“And so the hearts in the initiative, the hearts in the America’s initiative which was launched in 2016 now has some thirty-three countries in the region of the Americas implementing this. Belize implemented it in October 2023. They became the twenty-fifth country in the region to implement this. And I really want to give kudos to the Ministry of Health in recognizing the importance of ensuring proper and comprehensive management. of hypertension and diabetes as part of this initiative. And so PAHO is providing the technical cooperation in terms of training, capacity building, helping to provide the clinical guidelines as well as helping to provide some of the equipment in terms of, the clinically validated blood pressure machines that the health facilities will use to measure diabetes high blood pressure, et cetera. And we are really getting some funding support from the European Union for this workshop that we’re having today and to help to roll up the hearts initiative.”
Cuellar reiterated that the approach of HEARTS is complex, starting at the primary level before working its way through the sector. She said that it has displayed successful results in other regions that can be replicated in Belize with the right approach.
Doctor Karen Lewis Bell
“And so it’s a comprehensive package of care, and we do it in an integrated way, focusing on the first level of care, what we call the primary health care. As you may know, in many countries, in fact, in all countries, the first level of care is where the individual or the patients will first interface with the health system. And so we have to work at that level, at the village level, and to make sure that everybody understands and is doing the right thing. Doing you know, the initiative in a structured way. And so with this we are building capacity So everyone is on the same page with the knowledge of what to do and how to do but in addition to that the countries that are further advancing the implementation in our region have actually shown significant improvement In the control of these conditions so hospital admissions will be decreased The complications that you may have, like amputation, strokes, heart attacks, will be decreased. And ultimately, we will decrease the deaths from these conditions.”
Sixty-three-year-old Anke Doehm was today sentenced to five years behind bars at the Belize Central Prison. Doehm, who was reportedly diagnosed with blood cancer in 2018, was found guilty of cruelty of a child. Doehm stood trial following the death of thirteen-year-old Fay Lin Cannon back in 2017. The tragic incident involving the abused teenager happened in San Pedro. The court determined that Fay Lin was malnourished and abused sexually and physically.
Doehm must also enroll in every rehabilitation programme at the prison. She will be eligible for parole after serving half of her prison term.
Thirty-three-year-old Michael Usher was fatally shot on Monday night in Belize City. It happened a few minutes before eight o’clock on Flamboyant Street. Investigators say that Usher was walking when he was approached by an unknown man who fired several shots in his direction. Usher was shot several times and pronounced dead on arrival.
According to reports, police are looking for two suspects.
