Yesterday we interviewed Foreign Minister Wilfred Elrington and he held back on revealing the proposals for the referendum that the Guatemalans had taken to the OAS. But today in the House of Representatives, it seems he got the green light from the Prime Minister and was given special permission to make an announcement on a matter of public interest.
For most observers, it was more than interesting, it was quite surprising. Here's what the Guatemalans propose:
Hon. Wilfred Elrington - Minister of Foreign Affairs
"We were informed that the Guatemalans were making 2 proposals. 1, they wanted us to amend our referendum legislation so that our legislation will be identical to theirs in terms of the requirements for the referendum to be successful, just a simple majority vote. They said that if we did that, if we amended our legislation to confirm with theirs, they would then be prepared to agree on another date when we could hold simultaneous referenda, but they were not prepared to indicate when that date would be. And they were not even prepared to give a timeline. That was one proposal. The second proposal was that we would go ahead as planned, have our referendum on October 6, and if we had a successful 'yes' vote at that referendum, then they would prepared to hold their referendum at a date not later than the end of June 2014."
Prime Minister Dean Barrow - Prime Minister of Belize
"But I will say that I don't like what's being proposed by the Guatemalans, nevertheless, presumably after we've had a chance to analyze things closely - Hon. Leader of the Opposition has had a chance to do the same, and we can exchange views, we can take a unified national position."
Elrington says that Cabinet will review the proposal next week Tuesday, and the opposition representative who attended the meeting in Washington Lisa Shoman is also expected to brief her party. Thereafter, he hopes that government and opposition can come up with a national position which will be communicated to the OAS.
Email
Print