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Friday, March 29, 2024

World Down Syndrome Day

Photo: Students and staff of Stella Maris...

BPD awards 3 officers with Women Police of the Year

Photo: (l-r) Myrna Pena, Carmella Cacho, and...

Suicide on the rise!

Photo: Iveth Quintanilla, Mental Health Coordinator by Charles...

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BPD awards 3 officers with Women Police of the Year

Photo: (l-r) Myrna Pena, Carmella Cacho, and Shanice Bevans; BPD Female Police of the...

Suicide on the rise!

Photo: Iveth Quintanilla, Mental Health Coordinator by Charles Gladden BELMOPAN, Wed. Mar. 20, 2024 Since entering the...

NCA launches 8-year Strategic Plan

by Kristen Ku BELIZE CITY, Mon. Mar. 18, 2024 Belize’s aging population, which comprised 6% of...

Belize places Top 40 at Miss World 2023

Photo: Elise-Gayonne Vernon, Belizean contestant by Kristen Ku BELIZE CITY, Tues. Mar. 12, 2024 22-year-old Elise-Gayonne Vernon...

GOB announces $70 million budget adjustment

In a late evening press release, the Government Press Office announced the decisions taken at today?s Cabinet meeting, which we condense as follows:

Policy Actions

1. Settle the BTL matter and dispose of the remaining shares;

2. Pursue the orderly liquidation plan for the DFC, and by so doing, indicate that in the foreseeable future the DFC will no longer be a drain on the public purse;

3. Pursue, through legal means, those who owe Government and other public sector bodies;

4. Build social consensus in support of the adjustment program; and

5. Develop, in consultation with the IMF, a medium-term adjustment program, including fiscal and monetary adjustment measures, without entering into a formal IMF standby program.

Policeman witnesses stabbing death of Wasani Belgrave, 21

Police Liaison officer, G. Michael Reid, told Amandala today that the department is still seeking Alex Palacio, of a Reggae Street address, in connection with a fatal stabbing incident that occurred over a week ago.

According to a report by an off-duty police officer, he was walking along Caesar Ridge Road, in the Yarborough area, on Thursday, May 19, sometime after 4:00 p.m., when he observed an altercation between two male persons on the street.

GOB?s new euphemism ? ?homegrown?!

Despite what the ratings agency, Standard & Poor?s, today reported as Belize?s ?heightened risk of default,? Cabinet this evening decided that it would not pursue a financing bailout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), but would instead implement some of the IMF?s recommendations made earlier this month, as a part of what GOB claims is another ?homegrown? program to improve the Government?s financial stance.

Our sources tell us that this would mean another wave of cuts in the recurrent and capital budgets, including the hacking of some contract officers and open vote workers. This would be followed later by a revamped tax system, which could entail a more broad-based tax regime that would, at the end of the day, siphon more money from the masses in the form of tax dollars.

The indomitable Frank Arana, former Amandala columnist, passes at 73

?Learn as if you were going to live forever. Live as if you were going to die tomorrow.?

?Mahatma Gandhi

Amandala received the sad news this week that the respected and widely read Belizean writer Francisco B. Arana, Sr., better known as Frank Arana, had passed away at 8:53 a.m. on Saturday, May 21, due to a heart attack. He died at the age of 73.

He will be laid to rest on Saturday, May 28, 2005, after funeral services scheduled for 2:00 p.m. at the Our Lady of Guadalupe Co-Cathedral in Belmopan.

 

Jealous ex-lover bites man on lip over woman

On Monday, May 16, Albert Lawrence, 26, a security guard of #128 Neal Pen Road, appeared in the Belize City Magistrate?s Court, where he was charged with grievous harm, to which he pleaded not guilty.

Lawrence was charged in connection with an incident that occurred on Thursday, April 14 around 11:30 p.m., which was reported by Daniel Francis, 22, a construction worker of Miles 4 ? Northern Highway.

BDF guilty of Aaron Mariano manslaughter ? P.C. guilty of abetment

Yesterday in Supreme Court #2 before Justice ?Troadio? Gonzalez, a jury of 4 men and 5 women deliberated for almost 5 hours and then handed down a guilty verdict to Belize Defence Force Private Giovanni Gutierrez, 23, for manslaughter, and to P.C. Dennis Palacio, 28, for abetment to commit manslaughter, for the death of Aaron Mariano, 21.

Palacio was found to have purposely encouraged the commission of the crime, and almost had a unanimous decision by the jury, 7-2. Gutierrez had a unanimous decision from the jury.

BTL ? so near and yet so far!

An imbroglio bred by lack of trust, foreign and local legal battles, divisions between workers and management of the Belize Telecommunications Limited (BTL), ?mistakes? made by the Government of Belize (GOB), and capitalist maneuverings by two very influential multimillionaires, have over 500 workers of Belize?s most lucrative company between ?a rock and a hard place? in their bid to return ownership of the company to Belizean hands.

Currently the majority of BTL?s shares and directorships are in the hands of American Jeffrey Prosser and Englishman Sir Michael Ashcroft. BTL?s workers?who have been resisting foreign-domination of the establishment?have been leading the charge to have the company ?re-Belizeanized.?

Toddler, 2, missing 5 days – remains eaten by vultures

Police suspect foul play

The sighting of a flock of vultures was what led a neighbor of Sunday Wood, a village in the Toledo District, to the gruesome discovery of the remains of a toddler, Rosendo Coy, 2 ? years old, who was reported missing on Thursday, May 12.

After five days of intense searching by a team of police, BDF and concerned citizens, the child was found sometime around 11:00 a.m., on Tuesday, May 17. His skeletal remains were found in a milpa. There were just a few scattered bones left after the body was eaten by vultures. Latest information from police is that a bone analysis by Dr. Mario Estradabran is presently underway in Punta Gorda, which will confirm if the remains found on Tuesday are indeed that of the missing toddler.

 

Loren Augustus, 31, shot in the forehead – critical at Universal

A young father of two, Loren Dale Augustus, 31, is in critical condition at the Universal Health Services after he was shot once in the forehead sometime around 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday, May 17, at the corner of St. Matthews and St. Charles Streets in the Kings Park area of Belize City. Augustus was riding his bicycle home after leaving work at Tropic Air at the Municipal Airstrip when he was shot with a .22 pistol.

Augustus? prognosis is not good, said Dr. Jorge Hidalgo, as the bullet is lodged deep in his brain. He has been placed on a ventilator, which is breathing for him. There is no surgical procedure that can be performed to remove the bullet because of its location, said Dr. Hidalgo.

?I just do it?? says Anthea Sutherland, Female Cross Country Champ 2005

It might appear as a mission impossible for a married store supervisor and mother of three, to emerge, after only a year and several months in the game as the champion of the biggest female cycling race in the country. But the lady, Anthea Sutherland, proved that it is all do-able?with determination, that is!

Anthea recalled that she was a successful athlete in her schooldays, but after she graduated from the Belize Technical College (BTC) in 1986, she essentially set aside her sports?track racing and cycling.

Catherine Garbutt, dead at 84

Catherine Garbutt, better known as ?Ma Kate,? 84, of #130 Vernon Street, died on Wednesday, May 11, at 10:00 p.m. This year June would have made 27 years that she has been residing in the St. Martin de Porres area. Catherine Garbutt previously resided in Cubali Alley off Water Lane.

Ma Kate was found by her son, Denton Garbutt, 49, the supervisor of Amandala Press/KREM Radio and facilitator of the Kremandala Show, at 6:00 on Tuesday morning, May 10, in a comatose state in her room. She was taken to the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital, where she did not regain consciousness, and died a day later.

GOB ? you are ?unsustainable!?

The Government of Belize, via a statement from the Ministry of Finance, headed by Prime Minister, Hon. Said Musa, on Wednesday, May 11, issued both the preliminary findings of the recent visit of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in April/May, 2005, as well as its position on the IMF recommendations.

The good news in GOB?s report is that the Belize growth rate was 4.2% in 2004, thanks mainly to tourism, construction and manufacturing, and GOB is projecting another 3% growth in the current year, 2005.

?High-class? cheating at Muffles College – students bought exam papers for $2,000!

According to information from the principal of Muffles College today, a number of students, which included a Minister of Government?s son, were caught cheating in diploma exams. They will not, however, suffer the penalties prescribed by school regulations, which call for a ?0? or ?F,? along with 10 demerits and a failing grade in the subject for a final exam.

The cheating students, we were told, would be graded on the subjects in question by using their regular term grades and test papers, which would be used to give them an overall grade.

The Newco/Lufthansa deal ? the players

Since last Friday, May 6, 2005, there has been a lot of talk about Newco Limited?a company registered in Belize in late 2002. Newco is a company owned by a group of American investors who have called for United Nations arbitration over the Government of Belize?s decision to abandon an agreement it supposedly had with the group for the management and expansion of Belize?s international airport (the Philip Goldson International Airport).

GOB had claimed that it abandoned the agreement because the American investors were not living up to their deadlines, and it instead entered into a second agreement with a new group of investors from Belize, the USA and the UK.

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