Email

Print

The chief elections officer discussed it:

Josephine Tamai, Chief Elections Officer
"Well, that is a matter for the court, before the courts. And, I don't believe we could try the matter in the public. And so, because an appeal was filed, the court would make the decision on those. And so we had during the transfer period whereby it was 101 persons and we had 23 persons when it was the annual revision. Like I said, both of them is a matter before the High Court. And so, we must await the decision of the High Court for us to either remove or insert persons in other divisions."

Courtney Menzies:
"In terms of the other 23 who were supposed to transfer, that was supposed to happen in July. So what happens, considering the elections are March, do they continue on the Cayo North list or do they get transferred early?"

Josephine Tamai, Chief Elections Officer
"No, they are still on the Cayo North list because like I said, the representation of the people act specifically states that whenever a decision is made at the High Court, the High Court will inform the registering officer, and only then will the registering officer be able to take out those persons from the list or leave them on the list. So it has to be a decision that the court makes. And so till then we cannot take any action."

Courtney Menzies:
"Is it frustrating for your office that mass political parties, they get involved in these type of fraudulent schemes, they transfer people who don't live into the area, you know, and then they pay them to transfer and all of these things. Is it frustrating for you guys? Is there anything that can be done to sort of minimize this or reduce or completely eliminate this type of corruption?"

Josephine Tamai, Chief Elections Officer
"Well, I always say, and for me, it goes, as a citizen of Belize as well, it goes both ways, because I would only hope that the citizens, we don't allow for those things to happen, because every single application that comes to this department our officers go out and conduct investigation. We have investigation sheets whereby the persons would sigh, the law speaks to the chief occupant. And so, when our officers go to the person's house, if the chief occupant says that the person lives there, it is a challenge for us to dispute that the person does not live there. We do not have the authority to go inside that person's house and search their houses to see. And I will tell you some people would get crafty. Some of them may well, you know, I put a picture of the person in the house. So even if you come, the picture is there and there's so many different things. We have seen cases as well where our offices disallows some persons, and when they go to court, they actually present receipts in court to say they were renting the houses."

"And so, yes, it becomes frustrating at many times because then all sorts of accusations come from it. But everybody has to do their part. We should be each other's keepers in this and just don't wait until when an election is being called to make all these accusations and all these things."