It must be the first time in the history of Belize that the Nays had it in the House of Representatives. The final score was 17 NAYs (UDP) and 11 AYEs (PUP). It would not have happened if the Speaker of the House was compliant, was like the pastor in the Senate. The Prime Minister and his deputy squirmed, but not all the latter’s piety nor the former’s wit, could save them from facing the Rules of the House.

The NAYs had it, and no amount of power can make them “lure back…cancel half a line…nor all (their) tears wash out a word “ of how they voted that fateful night they turned their backs on the rights of Belizeans living abroad.

“Resent” is not my word

I need to make a correction to Mr. Wayland’s letter to the Amandala, which was published on March 26, 2019, on page 15. I’m carrying a beef over some words Mr. Wayland hib my way some time ago, and maybe I will get a break someday to respond, but this response, correction, has absolutely nothing to do with that.

I had written about the response of a Reporter columnist (Mr. Neri Briceño) to a response from Mr. Lee Mark Chan about an article the Reporter columnist had written. In a nutshell the matter there had to do with Chinese domination of business, and the way they conduct their business affairs in Belize. I had contributed that the Mennonites are also dominant in Belize.

Mr. Wayland wrote that I “mentioned that roots Belizeans resent the Chinese and Mennonites’ economic success.” Maybe it is his observation that Roots Belizeans feel that way, resentful, or that I was being kind with my words, that “resent” is what I wanted to say. But no and no, if Belizeans (Roots) resented the Chinese and the Mennonites, they wouldn’t buy their products or shop at their stores.

I never used the word, resent. I wrote that Roots Belizeans are not making it in Belize, that our people “are backed up on a cliff, and many are falling over.” I wrote that the Chinese and Mennonites are “absolutely dominating at this time”, that roots Belizeans are becoming “more marginalized each day”, that our “youth are becoming violent and many of them are in jail”.

I wrote that the Chinese leader is concerned because the Chinese community is “targeted by some people in our country”; I wrote that the government needs to give more support to Roots Belizeans because they are not equipped to compete with the Chinese and the Mennonites and “bad things happen to a people when they control no businesses in a country.”

I see how Mr. Wayland might translate that to resentment, but I needed to clear that up because I don’t know that, and because I don’t know anyone who resents the Chinese and the Mennonites. There might be Roots Belizeans who harbor resentment, but it is possible that most Roots Belizeans who attack and rob and even hurt Chinese grocers, do so because they are absolutely destitute, starving to death.

That said, I congratulate Mr. Wayland for baldly saying what he sees, that Roots Belizeans don’t have a work ethic, they have a “recreation ethic.” I have my opinion on that, but for now I will hope to read and hear what others have to say on the matter.

Sedi and – Kaibil, UB, restraint

I don’t have as much information as the Foreign Minister has, but what I have is that the Belizean soldiers who were kidnapped, the ones Sedi Elrington spoke about in the House, were not on Belizean soil and were on extracurricular business when they were taken into custody over there.

Mr. Elrington would want to compare that incident with his shameful, disgraceful performance when Guatemalan officials accosted some Belizeans on the Sarstoon and took them into custody.

If I swallowed what Mr. Elrington said in the House, I would believe that UB is a dud, a waste of time and money. Now, I don’t talk much about book education because I was no model student. I respect formal education, but I didn’t always see it that way.

I went to school because my mother insisted that I go to school. Somehow, I had the qualifications, earned a scholarship to junior college, and when I rejected that, my dad asked me if I didn’t want to try for a scholarship to Zamorano. I rejected that, for my reasons, and went to sea. I left the sea when the Belize School of Agriculture opened, because I wanted to go there. I didn’t go abroad to study more agriculture, for my reasons. I don’t belong to the system, but I have basic sense and I have a right to my views.

My view is that Mr. Elrington completely ran over, stomped on UB, when he ran on and on about the virtues of the Teachers College, the Technical College, and the Nurses School. I don’t know as much as Sedi does about the education system in Belize, but I know that UB produces talented nurses, teachers, and scientists. I think he ran all over UB.

I have to find something good about the gentleman, and I think it is worthwhile to note that not once in his presentation did he run down the name of George Price. He fished around, but every time he did, a warning voice came into his ear and pulled him away from Pickstock Street. Maybe it wasn’t a warning voice. It could be because he is shamelessly using Price’s picture to push the road to the ICJ. It could be that he isn’t really after being the next prime minister, but instead he is after retiring, and he didn’t want to go down as the man who ran down George Price’s name EVERY SINGLE TIME he went to the House.

Whatever his reason, he deserves a little kudos for what must have been a desperate struggle to restrain the pain that he has shown exists within him.  Let’s see, if he doesn’t retire, which he should, ahem, and he becomes the prime minister, which he shouldn’t, ahem, in a five-year term he will go to the House 60 more times. Thank gudnis hihn di laan fu handle ih beef.

Roaring Creek to become  a town?

I heard the Minister of Works, Rene Montero, and the Prime Minister, Dean Barrow, comment that the rehabilitated road between Roaring Creek and Santa Elena has been designed to have some important features for the purpose of increasing road safety. I have said that the minds that conceived this road are at best, inconsiderate.

Roaring Creek is one of the largest villages in our country; twenty years ago they had a sign up which said the population of the village was 3,000. It is a village which has just about run out of space for expansion, so they will have to start building three stories, and up. Ah, several years ago one of their chairpersons, Pastor Richard Smith, made a move to acquire land in Camalote, their neighbor to the west. Camalote, physically, is one of the largest villages in the country, extending from Mile 49 on the George Price Highway, beyond Mile 51. Pastor Smith’s expansionism was rebuffed.

For some time now, I have been calling out the authorities to put in pathways in villages, alongside the highway, but the authorities are going for something more advanced in Roaring Creek. In that village they are putting in cement pathways, on both sides of the highway, at the curbs. They started putting in the side paths over a month ago and if we go by the pace at which they are going, and they are to extend the length of the village, they will complete it by the end of this year. They are moving at a real crawl.

While they crawl, the villagers are exposed to the full danger of vehicles.

Roaring Creek, if the authorities follow through on what they have begun on the highway that passes through there, will likely look like Belmopan when it is finished. But the vehicles passing through will be moving at much higher speeds than the speed at which vehicles in Belmopan move.

It might be different if Roaring Creek is declared a town. Drivers will automatically slow down when they see a sign that says they are within “town limits.”