7 News Belize

The Fates Of Various Rosewood
posted (February 7, 2013)
Tonight two containers of Rosewood are sitting at the Forestry Department compound in Belmopan. And then there's also the container sitting at the Benque Viejo border.

And so, today, after a morning show appearance, the Chief Forest Officer gave the full rundown on those two containers plus one more we reported on a month ago. That one was confiscated at the Port of Belize, because it was believed to have undeclared logs inside. Turns out it did have zericote logs. Wilbur Sabido explained:..

Wilbur Sabido
"However, when we opened the container and we found the Zericote in round or log form - that is against the law essentially. Zericote is protected species; it can only be exported as a value added product. So in that particular instance we seize the produce from the container. The exporter is a known exporter to us. He goes by the name of Anita Lou based originally out of Roaring Creek and now operating out of Orange Walk. The other situation is one that is more known which was about a month or so ago where we got reports that there were two containers in Belize Engineering yard that had rosewood in it and we contacted Police, Customs, BAHA and all the law enforcement agencies and it was so we actually had a 20' and 40' container that we took to our compound and when we off load it, it was a total of about 15,000 board feet that we were of rosewood that we were able to document. That particular exporter goes by the name of Kambokin. The two persons that registered that particular company - I can only recall the name of one; it's Pererra. In this particular instance we have only manage to make contact through the broker Mr. Raul Cawich. It's through him and with the DPP we are working to see how we can make contact with the actual owner of the material."

Reporter
"I am updating the confiscation in Benque."

Wilbur Sabido
"That particular situation is out of our hands at this point in the sense that it's still customs custody simply because customs gives a time period for the owner of the material to present legitimate documents and within a particular period of time they cannot present such documents then the controller of customs can then move to seize the property. Also at the same time because we suspect that the material is of Guatemalan origin we also contacted the Guatemalan authorities and they are very much concern about the fact that they have a container with rosewood of Guatemalan origin ending up in the customs area."

Reporter
"We don't expect its Guatemalan origin."

Wilbur Sabido
"Well it's alleged, but the Guatemalan authorities are doing their own investigation. We have our own suspicions."

Jules Vasquez
"We know you've been criticized in some quarters of the public for destroying wealth in destroying those flitches at Medina Bank. With these once they go through the process, might they be used for productive purpose?"

Minister Lisel Alamilla
"We haven't decided yet what we will do because we continue to find rosewood. In fact there are regular reports and we are confiscating 20-30 flitches at a time, so the amount of rosewood that we have on our hands are increasing almost on a weekly basis and we definitely have to put something forward to Cabinet for them to consider. So that decision won't lie with just my ministry."

Kambokin Enterprises Ltd is registered at a San Andres Road Address in Corozal.

As at August 19, 2012, the shareholders are Moses Liston Leslie and Sylvestre Tzib. In Dec, 2011 Kenny Zheng and Annie Zhou as joint subscribers voluntarily waived their rights to take up any shares in Kambokin enterprises limited.

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