And while the immediacy of that matter forced it to center stage today - the usual flurry of parliamentary fireworks were flying across the house floor.
And surprisingly, a shower of those fireworks came from the usually soft spoken Immigration Minister Carlos Perdomo. The Leader of the opposition singled him out for censure when he spoke on the adjournment. The Leader of the Opposition, John Briceno called for a commission of inquiry into the issuance of visas under Perdomo's tenure as well as the suspension of various senior staffers and diplomats.
Briceno pointed to 143 visas issued to Chinese under Perdomo's tenure - but what no one expected was when Perdomo pointed back….
John Briceno, Leader of the Opposition
"Well we know that at least 33 persons landed in 3 separate flights at night. We know of at least 143 persons that were granted visas in Cuba and Ecuador and have landed in Belize under questionable circumstances. On November 9th, we found out that the Belize Honorary Counsel in Ecuador became very concerned about Asian showing up in Quito, Ecuador with Belizean one way visas and the Ecuadorian police have been asking a lot of questions. The Honorable Counsel said, and I quote "there are other persons who pretend to travel today also from Sri Lanka but have been prevented by the police authorities of Ecuador who consider that these visas are false and fraudulently issued and which can be treated as an international trafficking of persons network." We are told that the Director of Immigration has confirmed that someone in his department was forging some documents. He knows of at least 2 instances of 2 sets of documents that allowed Sri Lankan nationals into Belize. So this is what we know so far, Mr. Speaker: A; planes are coming in from Haiti and landing at the Philip Goldson International Airport at night, B; one way visas are being issued by the bucket loads out of Cuba without supporting documents."
Carlos Perdomo, Minister of Immigration
We checked the records at The Immigration Department and where the Leader of the Opposition is crying about how we brought in 143 Chinese with legal visas when he was in power this is what you brought in 2007 just before election: 1,190 plus 458 Cubans, who was at the embassy at Havana then? Who was the Minister of Immigration then? I am not going to use any name but you guys are full of hypocrisy! At the rate we are allowing legitimate visas, it would take us 10 years to reach 1 year that you gave 1,160 visas, talk about that and you look at the record that we have, it is open, those papers that you read are all legal documents and it is good to note that 2 of the high executives at Channel 5 use to be diplomats and councilors for PUP and this is where we are getting the leak."
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