_{Maricarmen Plata, Chief of Mission}

by Charles Gladden

BELIZE CITY, Thurs. Mar. 13, 2025

Members of the Organization of American States (OAS) were deployed to various sections of the country as they are here to observe the 2025 General Elections, which took place on Wednesday, March 12.

The OAS deployed a 12-member team to Belize, comprising observers from seven countries, to the different districts, where they focused on the electoral process, including electoral organization and technology, political financing, and electoral justice.

“It’s important because it supports electoral authorities, as well as the different parties and the process itself. So, we follow up on the matters that can improve the democratic process in Belize, and that can help people participate in an environment that is truly [attentive] to the needs of everybody,” said Maricarmen Plata, Chief of Mission for OAS.

Additionally, the team engaged with various stakeholders, including electoral authorities, political parties, and government officials, to understand the electoral landscape.

During election-day, Plata was asked by the local media in the Saint Martin’s area of Belize City how the day was going from her team’s perspective.

“We have seen a very calm election. We have been seeing a good turnout … hopefully that will increase during the afternoon … we’re looking forward to seeing more people coming out this afternoon. There’s still a couple of hours left in the day, and we want to encourage people to come out because it’s important to have as much participation as we can. We realize it’s warm in the morning and not that much in the afternoon, so it would be great to see more people coming out and taking advantage of what we have left,” she said.

In previous visits to Belize, the OAS had highlighted the need for redistricting. Various organizations have brought up the matter by urging the government to take care of the redistricting before the March 12 elections, but that was unsuccessful.

“We are reviewing the present situation and that will be included in our report. We’ve been asking and following up on our prior recommendations, and that will be included in the report. We will issue a report at the end of the process, a preliminary report in the coming days and a full report [later on]. So, definitely [that is] something that we’ll be looking into and reporting on,” Plata said.

This is the fourth time that the OAS Electoral Observation Mission is in Belize. They were present for the 2012 and 2015 General Elections, and a 1997 mission focused on voter re-registration.