by Colin Hyde

The easy solution for those Lower House aspirants in the Upper House that repeatedly refer to Madam President as Madam Speaker, is for Madam President to have a great sign made and placed in front of her on her desk. We wouldn’t want a new rule that three false calls force an offender to yield; but we have to protect Madam President from an inferiority complex, and ehm, the government from having to explain why they shared the seats for the two presiding officers the way they did.

Indeed – no mischief making, the women know they are both qualified – why did the PUP put Valerie in the Lower House, and Caroline in the Upper? Is it because Caroline had been partisan enough to run for a seat in a general election? But, Valerie’s name was all about town as a leading candidate for a PUP Belize City municipal election ticket. Speculation aside, Valerie might have wished she’d gotten the job in the more civilized House, after having to contend with Barrow’s son who was hell bent on being a thorn; and maybe Caroline wished she had had the opportunity to bully that young man, give him di sense.

I was about to give the Opposition an “A” at the inaugural meeting, until Sheena started talking about gender discrimination. She said she and Janelle had knocked heads, had gone through the budget, and gender issues popped out. Sheena didn’t give proper respect to cottage industries, sewing and embroidery, beads, that type of thing. I think Sheena, the daughter of a big lawyer who was a former Speaker of the House, and Janelle, the daughter of a superstar citrus grower who held a seat in the senate and served as mayor of Belmopan, I think they need their heads, ehm, knocked.

To stay out of trouble, I’ll keep this short. Way back, around 1940, my mom sat and passed all her O’ levels, six or seven of them. But my mom did not want your office job; my mom didn’t want to be “clerical”; she wanted to SEW, and to make children! Sorry, Ms. Sheena and Ms. Janelle can’t speak for women like my mom. There are women who love to work with their fingers. If it’s any consolation, our senate ladies are not alone in their misconception. Clerical men, like you find in the lawyer and other intellectual groups, kyaahn taak fu all guys. I support the belt as a tool for discipline, and I would use it on guys who use words to take advantage of brothers who don’t carry a thesaurus.

Boy, the UDP came so close to an “A”. If not for that lapse by Ms. Sheena, they would have been at the top of the class.

In spots, the PUP disappointed, especially Mr. Castillo, who was all about regurgitating terrible UDP misdeeds from 2008 to 2020. Is that what Hilly Bennett and Vaughan Gill prepped him with? Somebody should have told Castillo that Hilly, Vaughan, and Mike Rudon are the last people you want to hang out with if you get exalted to the Upper House. I would have given the bright, new, young PUPeez a pass, if they didn’t try to fill out the minutes. They would have done much better short and sweet.   

In the social partners’ branch, bah, Dennison looks like he wants to grow up to be like Lower House types like Finnegan and Diki Bradley. A stab or two at being cute is okay, but in the stiff Upper House keep a straight face. But I give him an “A” for joining Herrera in the call for the accounting. I’d have to listen to Janelle again to give her a grade, but I recall she spoke about the accounting too, and because that goes to the core, she is certain of passing.

Louis Wade, I lost much of his presentation because I couldn’t get past his opening salvo. Brother, you were way off trying to justify your faulty sewer pond call several months ago. You’re a successful businessman, Louis, but your math is weak, and your biology, note that when you went off to make music and got involved in media, the public servant leaders of the Health Ministry doubled down on their major. Be careful how you question people’s integrity and intelligence.

Of course, there was substance in your hour-long show. But guy, please, if realtors upped the price of their parcels in the $6.9 million area, that had little or nothing to do with the price of the government’s purchase, and a lot or everything to do with government’s purpose for the purchase. If government had spent $10 million for the land because Belmopan needed a larger sewer pond or a dump site, realtors would have been scrambling to get sales for their properties. If government had spent $1 for the land or bought it from ReConDev at the 2018 price, for the present purpose, building a hospital, realtors would have done what you said they did. There are a few holes in your argument, Louis. But we can wait to plug them.

For parents of the young who need public help

I don’t think there can be anything more painful for a person than to have a seriously sick child. It’s nigh impossible to empathize with the child, I guess you’d have to have experienced serious illness; but we should be able to get closer to the feelings of the parent, have some idea of what they are going through. It has to be rough.

People who have children are doing the greatest service to the nation. People are a nation’s greatest resource. Nations so prize children that they make threats against women who want to end pregnancies. Women take risks to have children. The World Bank Group says “maternal mortality ratio is the number of women who die from pregnancy-related causes while pregnant or within 42 days of pregnancy termination per 100,000 live births”; and “the maternal mortality ratio in Belize has improved from 98 in 2000 to 67 in 2023. Maternal mortality in Belize is nearly the same as its regional average.” Wow, 67 deaths per 100,000 women seems incredibly high to me, hard to believe. Seriously, I am stunned.

There’s a risk for parents that the child could be born with serious illnesses or physical ailments. Enough cannot be said about retired surgeons who have the spirit of Jesus, and Rotary and similar organizations that step in and help. God bless all of you.

I couldn’t get any statistics on children born with serious illnesses/ physical ailments in Belize, but humans being more or less the same everywhere, this report from AI Overview should give us an idea. The data gleaned by AI Overview says 1 in 700 babies in the US (less than 1%) is born with Down syndrome, “roughly 1 in 285 children will be diagnosed with cancer before their 20th birthday … about 1 in 365 Black or African American babies are born with sickle cell disease (SCD) … In the U.S., leukemia accounts for approximately 30% of all childhood cancers [which] makes leukemia the most common type of cancer in children.”

My, the pressure that must be on families who have children who need special care! Parents of sick children shouldn’t be burdened with having to fund raise to help their kids with special needs. That responsibility should be entirely on the state. The state goes to great lengths to promote the coupling of males and females, and they pass laws to protect the product while it’s in the womb, because a state needs children. There are risks to this thing. People should be paid when things don’t go according to plan.

Immediately a child with special needs is born, the parents should be entitled to a hundred-thousand-dollar grant, for starters. The money has to come from somewhere. The UDP is telling us to watch the NHI. We don’t want unnecessary tests and the dispensation of drugs because it is “free.” The youngsters must be priority. The funds must be directed their way so they get the specialist care.

As far as we know, we only pass through this world once, and our greatest effort must be toward giving our children with special needs the best chance at it. Productive citizens need special care, oldsters have earned special care, but the children must be the priority. Give them a chance at the best life. To do that we must give their parents the best of what we have.