U.D.P. Says Government Knew MCC Grant Loss was Coming

The Government of Belize is about to lose access to a hundred and twenty-five million dollars in a development grant from the United States. This loss comes after the Department of Government Efficiency decided to shut down the foreign aid agency, Millennium Challenge Corporation. With the closure of this five-year grant agreement, the government must now scramble to find alternative funding for the planned transformative educational and energy projects. U.D.P. Senator designate Patrick Faber, didn’t hold back in criticizing the government for not securing alternative funds sooner. He emphasized the urgency of finding new sources to keep these vital projects on track.

 

Patrick Faber, U.D.P. Senator Designate

“And one other issue that I will add to that list of things that they have been silent on is the MCC project withdrawal of funding by the US government. The government has demonstrated, in fact, that it is ill-prepared, or they have no plan. We are waiting patiently, of course, for the budget, which is all the more reason why I join with my party leader in sending the signal that it is intolerable, that the budget has not been read, because that would be a good space for the government to tell us what exactly they plan to do. When the Trump administration, the United States government, and it’s not just today, it happened. We got the warning. In fact, if you follow the US politics, you knew that this would’ve happened a long time ago. The minute Mr. Trump won the election, you knew that it was coming. So we need to be told as a nation, what is it that the government intends to do? You’ve heard about the trade wars, but you’ve heard about now, you’re hearing now about the withdrawal of these funds. This is serious money. This is a quarter of a billion dollars with a B that the MCC project would have brought for education, for energy, for agriculture. These things are important pillars of our economy. Yet we have not heard anything official from the government as to, in fact, we haven’t heard from them that it’s happening officially at all.”