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Hon. Francis Fonseca, Leader of the Opposition
"We the leaders, the members and supporters of the People's United Party both past and present wish to express our strong solidarity with the Rt. Hon. Said Musa and his family during this time of personal challenge. As we all know the Rt. Hon. Said Musa has served as our PUP leader from 1996-2008; as Prime Minister of Belize from 1998-2008 and of course he still currently an elected member of the House of Representatives representing the Fort George division. As we gathered here today condemned in the strongest possible terms this act of violence against Mr. Musa and his family. We view any personal attack or act of violence against the Rt. Hon. Said Musa and his family as an attack against the People's United Party family."

"As we meet this morning too many of our communities are a grip with fear and uncertainty. Too many of our fellow citizens have lost their sense of personal security. These are very troubling, very challenging times for our country and we in the People's United Party have made it absolutely clear that we are a part of the solution; we are very much interested in working with anyone who is prepared to work with us to try to solve this very difficult challenge facing our country."

Rt. Hon. Said Musa
"Today when we look at what is happening in our country we have to realize that we are heading down hill very fast. We are heading towards Belize falling apart and I don't want to sound mellow-dramatic about it but this is exactly where we seem to be going - no clear direction, no clear leadership, people are confused, people don't know from day to day what's going to happen next and certainly in Belize City it is a very difficult situation that people experience day by day with the random shootings, with the crime and violence completely out of control, so my friends all this call for us to really take stock of the situation and to see what we can do to address this situation. I am not going to go into proposed solutions of dealing with the crime problem because I am sure you have heard it time and time again coming from the leadership of the People's United Party - suggestions, resolutions, proposals made and not followed by the administration. The point that I wanted to make today is really to express gratitude to you all for coming out because it clearly shows that not only you feel for me and I am grateful for that and my family but you also feel that we really have to do something about what is going on in our country."

Hon. John Briceno
"I am here like the rest of you to express our solidarity with the Rt. Hon. Said Musa and his family and also to express a concern about the direction that this country has been going over the past 5 years. For quite some time we have been alerting the government that things are not going well - that we are losing direction, that the criminals are running free in our society and running havoc on peaceful communities and that pretty soon we are now becoming the prisoners in our homes. As the Rt. Hon. Said Musa just said if criminals feel that they can go after somebody like himself; a former Prime Minister, that means that each and every one of us are vulnerable, not only the Prime Minister or the ministers are people that are involved in politics like ourselves but even people in the business community. This is a wakeup call to all of us that this is no longer matter of a PUP or a UDP issue, or they are attacking a PUP so let's not bother about - this is beyond that. This is showing now that the criminal elements in our society are becoming more bold, they believe that they can get away with anything that they do. They believe that even some people in government might be protecting them and that has to stop and needs to stop now ladies and gentlemen. I want to call out on the government, the Prime Minister in particular for them to start to take actions now - the time for talking is over ladies and gentlemen, our people are tired of it, our people are desperate, our people are afraid and they want to see action taken now."

And last Friday the Opposition Leader Francis met with 40 George Street residence to listen to their concerns about the gruesome murders that occurred on January 8th in their neighborhood. He made mention at the press briefing this morning that his party will be working along with these residents to try and create ways to better move forward.

That area - due in no small part to its gang colour, red - is considered to be historically a UDP stronghold.