A House Meeting is scheduled for Friday and the Leader of the Opposition has officially informed the Speaker of the House of Representatives that Patrick Faber and Tracy Panton are no longer members of the United Democratic Party. The letter, signed by Opposition Leader Moses “Shyne” Barrow is requesting that the Speaker of the House, Valerie Woods, “declare at the next Sitting of the House of Representatives that Members from Albert and Collet have ceased to be members of the House of Representatives by reason of having been a member of a political party”. In summary, Barrow’s letter informs the Speaker of the House that Faber and Panton no longer represent the United Democratic Party in parliament. With such a declaration, questions have now arisen about the seating arrangements for the parliamentarians on Friday. Where will Tracey Panton and Patrick Faber be seated. The new space inside the George Price Center does not allow for a second row on the opposition’s side of the House. So, the most likely position would be further down the aisle, if the Speaker of the House is to honor this request. Collet Area Representative, Patrick Faber, has since come out to say that the letter is riddled with baseless claims that he has resigned from the United Democratic Party. In a Facebook post he noted that this is not the first time the opposition leader has wrongly invoked the Constitution for political gain. In his statement, Faber went on to say that, “Barrow’s actions display either a profound misunderstanding of the Constitution or a malicious intent to undermine my position”. We will continue to follow these latest developments.
Category: Politics
Will Tracy and Patrick Support Shyne’s Motions in the House?
Friday’s house meeting will be the first since the Briceño administration purchased the controversial piece of land in Belmopan, a few weeks ago, for the construction of the University Hospital. The sitting of the House of Representatives will also be held at the George Price Center for Peace and Development, while the Assembly Building is being refurbished. But will the elected members of the opposition turn out to support Shyne Barrow on any of these issues given what has been taking place internally. Here’s U.D.P. mouthpiece Delroy Cutkelvin.
Delroy Cutkelvin, Cayo Zone Coordinator, U.D.P.
“As an opposition, one of the main role of the opposition is to keep the government in check and in line, not just to win a general election. And this case in point that I raised underscores that. Here is an outrageous deal that the entire nation is revolted by and yoh cyant let we off di hook and we can’t let ourselves off the hook. We are the constitutional opposition.”
Isani Cayetano
“So this will be the first house meeting since that land was purchased, contentious as the issue is, Shyne Barrow will be there as the Leader of the Opposition. We don’t know exactly what the seating arrangements for the other dissenting to will be, God knows if Sista B or Hugo Patt will be there. So is he then to stand before the “Honorable House” and share his official position without the backing of the other four, considering how small as it is the opposition actually is?”
Delroy Cutkelvin
“Well I have no reason to believe that the representatives will not be there other than one particular member who we know has had her issues with attending house meetings for her reasons which I won’t try to defend at all. But I have no reason to believe that the honorable Hugo Patt will not be there. I have no reason to believe that the honorable Patrick Faber and the honorable Tracy Panton will not be there.”
U.D.P. Says All Efforts to Resolve Internal Issues were Exhausted
According to Cutkelvin, despite the firmly held position of others in the echelons of the United Democratic Party, all attempts were made to resolve the issue between Party Leader Shyne Barrow and the Alliance for Democracy via mediation. That effort, nonetheless, also proved fruitless.
Delroy Cutkelvin, Cayo Zone Coordinator, U.D.P.
“When the central executive first met to consider this matter of this so-called breakaway group, there were some who came to that meeting with their minds made up that they were going to move swiftly to deal with this matter. There were others like myself, Diane, people like Lindsay Garbutt, people like Alberto August who said let us give an opportunity for a mediation process and there were some who said what if the mediation process yields no positive results? And I was quick to say, we have to be positive and optimistic that it will yield positive results because we all love this party.”
Isani Cayetano
“But it didn’t, hence the reason…”
Delroy Cutkelvin
“But I am just making the point that the party leader, the chairman and others have exercised great restraint in making certain decisive moves in terms of addressing what is happening here. So I am making the broader point that there is much democracy at work in the operations of the party because it was because of our insistence that we must give another opportunity to try to make this thing work. It’s because of that that we ended up with a mediation process in the first place and no one can rule out the possibility that some kind of mediation can happen still. I continue to maintain that the UDP has been through these kinds of tribulations and trials before and we have eventually worked it out.”
Harris and Trump Face Off on Presidential Debate Amid Upcoming US Elections
In a highly anticipated presidential debate held in Philadelphia on Tuesday night, Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump squared off for the first—and potentially last—time. The 90-minute debate proved to be a heated exchange between the two. It presents a stark contrast to the previous June 27 debate between President Biden and Trump.
Harris, a former prosecutor, used her opening statement to launch sharp criticisms at Trump. She accused him of implementing tariffs that would act as a sales tax on the middle class and labelled his presidency as presiding over “the worst attack on American democracy since the Civil War.” Harris also took aim at Trump’s treatment of women on the topic of abortion and his praise of foreign dictators, citing Trump’s intention of implementing Project 2025.
Trump, on the defensive, criticised Harris for moderating her positions since the 2020 Democratic primary, suggesting she had adopted some of his views. He also emphasised issues like inflation and immigration, accusing Harris of being an extension of Biden. “She is Biden,” Trump claimed.
However, Harris chided back to Trump for his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden. She noted, “Donald Trump was fired by 81 million people.”
The debate featured ABC’s David Muir and Linsey Davis interjecting to fact-check the candidates and co-moderating the debate. Including Trump’s claim about Haitian immigrants in Ohio eating dogs and other pets.
“They’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, they’re eating the cats,” Trump declared. “They’re eating the pets of the people that live there, and this is what’s happening in our country, and it’s a shame.”
Muir immediately fact-checked Trump’s claims, saying that the city manager in Springfield, Ohio, told the network there had been no credible reports of pets being harmed, injured, or abused by people in the city’s immigrant community.
Trump later criticised the debate as unfair, claiming it was “three on one.”
Despite Harris’s strong performance, the outcome of the 2024 race remains uncertain. Polls continue to show a tight race.
For Belize, a small Caribbean nation with close ties to the U.S., the outcomes of such debates can have indirect but notable implications. The policies and positions of U.S. presidential candidates can influence international relations, trade agreements, and economic aid, all of which are crucial to Belize.
U.D.P. Vice Chair August Takes Alliance to Task on Unity Convention
The expulsion of Tracy Panton, Patrick Faber, John Saldivar and Beverly Williams from the United Democratic Party is the result of a series of issues that culminated in a failed attempt at recalling the leadership of Shyne Barrow. That’s according to Deputy Chairman Alberto August. Earlier today, August and National Campaign Manager Lindsay Garbutt did their media rounds, essentially responding to several claims made by the Alliance for Democracy earlier this week. To begin with, August established the fact that the Alliance for Democracy no longer has the right to be heard by the United Democratic Party since its members have been formally kicked out. As for the fate of an upcoming unity convention to be held by the Alliance in October, under the auspices of the U.D.P., August says he doesn’t know where that is coming from.
Alberto August, Deputy Chairman, U.D.P.
“Several things have been happening, da wahn evolution of various things. We have tried mediation with a team that Mr. Garbutt headed. We have tried negotiation and now we are at the point where we are at expulsion. The official document out of the UDP, as you rightly said, is that these individuals have been expelled from the party. So then, in terms of the UDP, they hold no locus standi and it is so unfortunate because when you are talking about people like the honorable Panton, and the honorable Patrick Faber, who has so much experience in politics, it is not something that you would want to do because they bring a lot to the party. But in life there are some things that you might have to do. They are calling this convention on the twentieth of October, I think, in Bird’s Isle. With no locus standi in the UDP, I mean they cannot be calling a UDP convention because there cannot be two UDP. We cannot be operating parallelly. So while they may be calling that, there’s only one UDP. So I don’t know what kind of convention they would be having, unfortunately. And I don’t know because I hear them talking about an interim leader and electing an interim chairman, but I don’t know where that is coming from. In terms of the UDP, like I said, having been expelled from the party, it places them in a precarious position.”
August Explains Support for Shyne Barrow’s Leadership
According to August, several attempts were made to resolve the falling-out between the Alliance for Democracy and the leadership of the United Democratic Party. They even resorted to mediation and when that effort was unsuccessful, Party Leader Shyne Barrow was left with no choice but to get rid of it’s members.
Alberto August, Deputy Chairman, U.D.P.
“After that process was completed and the mediators thought that they could not go any further, I think you are aware of the document that they might have produced, that they could not go any further, the leadership of the party still believed that we could have gotten our act together and we could have… because we are talking about senior members of the party, you know. Atrick Faber served one time as leader of the party, as you are well aware, deputy prime minister of this country. Tracy is a senior tourism professional and so we are not talking about the ordinary persons, the insignificant persons. I must acknowledge the efforts of our current leader was almost bending [over] backwards to getting them back onboard. He tried mediation and when that failed, he said let’s go to negotiation and when that failed now, the man is left with no other alternative but to do this because he needs to prepare his party for the upcoming general elections. Like I said, it began snowballing to where we are right now. If you would recall two years ago, I led the charge for the recall of the current leader, but I must admit that from then to now, he has come a long way in terms of the way how he governs the party.”
Has Shyne Barrow been Given a Fair Chance to Lead?
Among the issues that the Alliance for Democracy has with the leadership of Shyne Barrow is his inability to lead the U.D.P. to victory at the polls. Since taking office as party leader, Barrow has failed to deliver village council elections, municipal elections, as well as the recent bye-election in Toledo East. Here’s how August responded to that criticism.
Alberto August, Deputy Chairman, U.D.P.
“In politics, the success of a political party is determined by the amount of elections it wins. And so then, therefore, as the head of the party he must always be prepared to make his party winnable and puts the party up to win elections. That is what…”
Isani Cayetano
“That is what becomes the crux of the matter here. Those four are saying, “Look, part of the leadership challenge is that under Mr. Barrow we haven’t really won any of the elections that have taken place recently, including the bye-election a few months ago in Toledo East.”
Alberto August
“Because one of the unfortunate things in all of that, is that since he was elected as leader of the party, he has barely had time to focus on leading the party. What he has spent most of his time on is outing those types of fires that come up from time to time. And you specifically mentioned, like for example, the bye-election out in Toledo East. The division within our party resulted in the same people not coming to the front and shouldering what could have been maybe a better performance for the party.”
National Campaign Manager Weighs in on U.D.P. Fiasco
We also spoke with Lindsay Garbutt, the U.D.P.’s national campaign manager. He was part of a team that advocated for mediation to take place within the fractured party. Despite making a sincere effort to mend fences, Garbutt says the Alliance for Democracy went back on its word by seeking a recall of Shyne Barrow as party leader. But what about the John Saldivar factor? August and Garbutt weighed in on the ousted Belmopan standard bearer.
Lindsay Garbutt, National Campaign Manager, U.D.P.
“We made a genuine effort and I think I got together what is arguably the best group of people we could find as mediators and nationally recognized people of integrity, who all felt that a viable opposition is critical in our system of democracy. We met with both groups and after the second meeting we really felt that we were making some advances. Two hours after the second meeting, it was published that the Alliance for Democracy had sent out to the chairman a recall petition. It is extremely difficult to carry out mediation when both groups are not agreed and something like that happens. So unfortunately, the mediation ceased. But like what Alberto said, we still tried hard behind the scene to see if we could bring both groups to the table. There are some members that need to go and some new people that need to come in if this party is to have any success in the future.
Isani Cayetano
“John Saldivar seemingly remains an influential part in all of this, notwithstanding the fact that he lost stunningly in the 2020 general elections and he has taken a significant hit in terms of his credibility in politics.”
Alberto August, Deputy Chairman, U.D.P.
“It is interesting that you mentioned John Saldivar, but the influence that John Saldivar has on the party at this moment stems from the way how the party is governed in terms of the constitution, the dispersing of delegates. So when you have an individual who controls other people of like standing, it forms a group of delegates who can shift, because you will remember, you can recall, there was one point when John Saldivar was one hundred percent behind the current leader. When John Saldivar moves, he moves with a certain clique and the is the result of how the party is currently governed in terms of the constitution.”
UDP: Assault Charges Against Deputy Chairman are “Baseless, Vindictive, and Malicious”
The United Democratic Party (UDP) has come forward in defence of its Deputy Chairman, Alberto August, condemning the aggravated assault charges against him as a “baseless, vindictive, and malicious” attack aimed at silencing dissent. According to the UDP, the charges are a deliberate distraction from serious allegations of “illegal voter registration and electoral fraud at the San Ignacio office of the Elections and Boundaries Department,” stated the UDP in a press release.
The Party described these charges against August as a threat to democratic freedoms, stating, “The Freedoms of Speech and Expression are still constitutionally enshrined for every single Belizean citizen, including political opponents.”
According to reports, August was arrested and charged last Wednesday after a complaint from a Cayo resident who claimed he used insulting language towards her at the Elections and Boundaries Office in San Ignacio. August was arrested but granted bail and is awaiting arraignment due to a national conference attended by magistrates.
August responded with gratitude on Facebook for the UDP’s support. “Expressing personal “Thank You” to the United Democratic Party for its public display of support in the face of political prosecution,” stated August.
Tracy Panton: “We have Not Resigned; We Will Not Resign!”
The Alliance for Democracy, led by four members of the United Democratic Party who were deemed to have resigned, called a press conference today to categorically state that they have not and will not resign as members of the embattled party. Those four politicians are Albert Area Representative, Tracy Taegar-Panton, Collet Area Representative, Patrick Faber, Beverly Williams and John Saldivar. They presented a white paper that puts forward a proposal on how they intend to implement reform within the party. Notably, late this evening, the U.D.P. headquarters issued a press release, stating that the members of the Alliance are no longer U.D.P. and that the application period to fill vacancies for standard bearers in the areas they represent closes on September sixth. Taegar-Panton, who is supported by the Alliance as the party leader of choice, opened the briefing by explaining that they have not and will not resign from the U.D.P., regardless of what the leadership of the party says.
Tracy Taegar-Panton, Area Representative, Albert
“We want to be very clear to all those who are listening. The members who were constructively resigned by fifteen members of the Central Executive Committee would like to say categorically that we have not resigned from the United Democratic Party. We have not resigned. We will not resign, and we will be running for our respective constituencies in the next general election. We also want to reject this narrative that members of this alliance representing sixteen constituencies is on a mission to destroy the party, that we are on a mission to destroy the current party leader of the United Democratic Party. What this alliance seeks to do is to preserve the democracy of the United Democratic Party And by extension, the democracy of Belize.”