Dear Editor,

Please publish this letter to the Prime Minister of Belize, Hon. Dean Barrow.

Dear Prime Minister,

I am a woman, a mother, a Belizean, a servant of the people and a believer in God, and with all that I am I call on the Prime Minister of Belize to rescue our nation from the paralysis of fear and violent crime.

For too long law-abiding citizens like myself, who work hard every day to be productive members of our communities, have been victims of criminals with no heart, no soul and no love.

Mr. Prime Minister, I may not have fancy degrees plastering my walls, but I have enough common sense to know that any negotiation with these terrorist gangs is destined for failure. When a government will stoop to brokering deals with criminals, it shows that it has no power, no authority. That power is transferred to the terrorists, and that is exactly what they want.

Please, Mr. Prime Minister, it is time to listen to us, and heed our cries and not those of the very people who brutalize us at their whim.

It is way past the time when our government should have been implementing strict and critical legislation. Our nation needs laws which deal harshly with those holders of illegal weapons. We need stricter laws for drug and alcohol use. We need stricter penalties for violent offenders, for serial offenders, for rape, for assault.

Mr. Prime Minister, do you not agree it is time for us to at least have a national discussion on the enforcement of the death penalty, which is already written into our laws? We need the prison to operate as a prison, not a rest home for criminals.

Our nation is in need of infrastructure and resources are few – let us put criminals to work building homes for the poor, building roads, cleaning the communities which they have wronged.

Mr. Prime Minister, we need a national curfew to show that the government is serious about regaining control. The nation is in a state which demands it. The police are faced with a difficult task, and it is the responsibility of the government to make their jobs easier by creating responsible policies which they can enforce.

We ALL need to stand together and fight. Our nation is caught in the grip of a spiritual and political darkness, and it is only through unity that we will see the light.

Nancy Marin