The Gloves are Off! Chester and Kareem Fire Back at Mike Peyrefitte

During Tuesday’s U.D.P. press conference, former National Security Minister Mike Peyrefitte didn’t hold back, accusing the Commissioner of Police and the Minister of Home Affairs of deliberately underreporting the number of murders in 2024. According to Peyrefitte, there were actually ninety-four murders last year, but the Belize Police Department only recorded eighty-nine. In his fiery critique, Peyrefitte also renewed his call for the immediate removal of Kareem Musa as Home Affairs Minister and Chester Williams as Commissioner of Police. When we caught up with Musa and Williams in Belmopan earlier today, they had some strong words for Peyrefitte.

 

Kareem Musa, Minister of Home Affairs

“I saw that Peyrefitte was lamenting that in fact the number should have been ninety-four.  Now, when I listen to Peyrefitte and Shyne, I get the feeling like they are the grim reapers of governance and politics.  I never seen two people, well three, more pray out the lives of Belizean people than these people.  They are praying out the lives of these people, the numbers show that we had eighty-nine homicides, but they are getting up there to complain that it should be ninety-four.  We want more people dead in our country, like when they were in power, a hundred and forty-five.”

 

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“There is no false information being put out by the department.  Your figure is ninety-one and I could understand your ninety-one, because you have two in there, that one is still not yet classified.  That’s the one in San Pedro, and we also have one that is a manslaughter.  That’s how you reach to ninety-one.  We cannot categorize those as murders because manslaughter is not murder and that has not yet been classified.  We cannot put that as murder at this time.  So I can understand you.  But I cannot understand how Peyrefitte arrived at ninety-four, and then to say that, to have a country with a murder per capita of twenty-four is unacceptable.  I want to give him his records, the UDP records for the past, during their time in office, for the past twelve years.  They came into office in 2008.  2008, we averaged 39.9 per hundred thousand.  2009, 30.1 per hundred thousand.  2010, 40 per hundred thousand.  2011, 37.8 per hundred thousand.  2012, 43.4 per hundred thousand.  2013, 29.0 per hundred thousand.  2014, 35.2 per hundred thousand.  2015, 33.4 per hundred thousand.  2016, 27.9 per hundred thousand.  2017, 38.2 per hundred thousand.  2018, 37.8 per hundred thousand.  2019, 34.7 per hundred thousand.  2020, 26.o per hundred thousand.  Under the current administration, 2021, 31.3 per hundred thousand.  2022, 28.4 per hundred thousand.  2023, 21.5 per hundred thousand.  And 2024, 21.7 per hundred thousand.  So even if he wants to put it at twenty-four, it is still far better than what existed during the UDP’s twelve years in office.”