REPORT #436 October 2001

Produced by the Belize Development Trust
The Belize Development Trust over the years and long before it existed, received complaints of cases, of both political and civil service bribery in Belize. Probably the most common has been complaints with the national political police. It is not that common, but periodically in certain locations from Dangriga, to Corozal to Caye Caulker we do get these complaints.

More common are the complaints by foreigners, who are immigrating to Belize, or starting a business in Belize and that sort of thing, on a relatively small scale. Usually under a million dollar investment. They seem to get hussled by the occasional Cabinet Minister and also senior civil servants of departments, who want bribes to do their job. Mostly, these sort of complaints come from Belize City, and the Orange Walk and Corozal District. Some up in the northern part of the country seem to be very blatant about it, with senior civil servants alleging they represent Cabinet Minister's as bag men and want a bribe to carry a bribe also.

There is no way to investigate these things, or find out if such allegations are true, or not. You only have the word of the victim. Cold cash demanded and received is hardly traceable.

Locals rarely have to pay bribes, though it has happened, but more often is more subtle as in free drinks, or meals sometimes. Or a barter for services, such as sex. It does not seem to matter which political party is in power. Bribery complaints keep coming.

There are also many allegations of corruption in politics and mismanagement of the treasury funds of Belize. But under the current system, which is a British system, this is a built in purpose of exploitation of parliamentary "winner take all" government. There are currently no checks and balances to the corrupting influences and temptations of 'absolute power'.

There are many people, including the NGO Spear, as well as the Belize Development Trust debating and submitting BILLS for the changing of the parliamentary system to something better. A political framework in which the corroding effects of bribery, intrigue and ambitions are confined, controlled and limited in scope. Of course, there will never ever be an end to scandals of corruption and bribery. It is just not in human nature. We do hope that eventually, Belize will evolve to a more Federalized form of governing, so that bribery and corruption is isolated to individuals and small pockets, more easily caught and identified.

At the moment in Belize, there is no recourse to such things by law. For one, the difficulty of getting evidence. Though with SPY cameras and small tape recorders it could be done, but the National Police Force is a political party directed force and would never be able to operate such STING operations. Nor if they did, would such things ever be allowed to be prosecuted.

Such JUSTICE that occurs in Belize is warped and biased by a political angle. Fair justice is unlikely to be done and most of the scapegoats are the poor. Though this is a two edged sword and often investors, or well connected people can get out of non-threatening criminal charges by paying fines for lesser offenses.

Generally speaking, you are much less likely to be asked for a bribe in Belize than any of our neighbors, such as; Guatemala, Mexico, or Honduras. Most of the time, most government locally is fair and open. Though every transaction has a political price as the country is usually polarized into those who are known controlling political party supporters and those that are known to be political opposition supporters. Amazingly enough, for being a Banana Republic; the small country of Belize has a very large number of both politicians and bureaucratic civil servants that do very good honest jobs. So, if you are asked for a bribe, or tip. Please refuse! Stand up and be counted. It may cost you some inconvenience in government service, but is worthwhile for the future of Belize. Bribery and corruption is not the common standard in Belize. Though it occurs more often than many would like. But one could say this of anywhere, including the USA.

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Financial Management Development Programme - Belize

Responsible agency: DFID (UK) Project number: 083-004-001 Agreement partner: Government of Belize Implemented by: DFID, Government of Belize Type of aid: Bilateral Approval date: July 1997 End date: July 1999 Project stage: Completed Amount committed: 1,247,800 GBP (1,967,294 €) DAC sector: 99810 AC relevance: Implicit Recipient countries/regions: Belize Americas Keywords: Public (civil) service reform and management;Expenditure management, accounting; Project description: The project was much larger in scope than was recognized by the client, the consultants, and perhaps DFID itself. The project called for nothing less than the revamping of the entire Ministry of Finance, both structurally and in its method of doing business. Although it appeared initially that the Government of Belize was committed to the project, as its full implications were recognized, it became clear that the Government would be extremely hard pressed to meet its implied and explicit obligations from a resource point of view, both financially and in the availability and provision of trained personnel. Faced with the problem, decisions involving the commitment of resources were delayed time and again. These delays were experienced almost from the very outset. Indeed, the project initially ran without a Government of Belize leader for a full 12 months. As another example, the appoinment of a qualified individual to head the revitalised Belmopan Computing Centre - a central part of the entire plan - did not take place until some 16 months into the project. These are only the most glaring examples of tardiness in providing personnel. Many other posts needed for the successful completion of the project in areas such as the computerization of Accounts Payable and Funds Control were at the time of the final mission in March 2001 still unfilled. On a day-to-day basis, the project suffered from the lack of a continuous presence in Belize of appropriate consultants. In retrospect, a consultant's project officer should have been set up from day 1 and continuously staffed by appropriate consultants, with the Consultants' Project Leader permanently present and other consultants rotating as necessary. Because of the understaffing on the part of GoB, those GoB persons assigned to the project on a part time basis (or "full" time basis, for that matter), found themselves caught up in other day-to-day activities of their various departments. This in turn meant that for those periods when the consultants were not present in Belize, actions points were often not followed up, or took considerably longer than was planned. Project information last updated 21 Mar 2003

Contact persons: Jaya Singh Verma DFID 1 Palace Street , London, SW1E 5HE United Kingdom J-Verma@dfid.gov.uk P

Copyright The Global Village Newsline 2007