Fonseca Says AG’s Ministry Looked into Complaint Against Perez

One day after the Office of the Prime Minister announced the reinstatement of Belize Rural South Area Representative, Andre Perez as the Minister of the Blue Economy, the woman who had made a sexual misconduct allegation against him has come out swinging against him again. Wendy Auxillou took to Facebook to make an even more serious allegation than her previous one against Perez, which had resulted in his suspension for several months from the Cabinet. Auxillou has not made a police report against Perez to launch a criminal investigation, but today, Perez’ Cabinet colleague, Minister Francis Fonseca, told News Five that he supports the Prime Minister’s decision to reinstate Perez as a Cabinet minister and that the Attorney General’s Ministry had looked into the matter when Perez was on suspension.

 

Francis Fonseca, Cabinet Minister

“We have to operate on the basis of facts and we have to operate on the basis of a record. We can’t operate on the basis of social media reacting to social media. I think these matters have been, I think, fully ventilated. I have not heard anything new, any new material on this matter.”

 

Marion Ali

“Can you say, Minister Fonseca, if in the process of the ventilation – the full ventilation you spoke of on this matter, whether the Attorney General’s ministry was consulted and what input they had in the investigation?”

 

Francis Fonseca

“Yeah, I think, yes, we discussed this in Cabinet, so I don’t want to get into what we discussed, but yes, the answer is yes, the Attorney General’s ministry was involved and engaged and provided advice. This is confidential advice to the Prime Minister and to the Cabinet. So they were involved in that process and I think that’s advice that fed into the Prime Minister’s decision to have Minister Perez return. All decisions about Cabinet posts are solely matters for the Prime Minister but I certainly fully support the decision of the Prime Minister. I think Minister Perez was suspended from the significant period of time. And I think we all feel that, it’s appropriate at this time for him to return to cabinet. He was, in my view, a very effective minister before all of this, these issues, the issue arose. And I think he will once again be an effective minister of the blue economy.”