So now Chang stands stripped, much like the man he is allegedly linked to in the Citizen Kim Affair, Elvin Penner - which as we've noted before, is kind of odd, since each is, respectively, the first Chinese and first Mennonite elected in Belize.
But coincidences aside, the situation for Penner is far more serious. As we've reported he's being asked by his own party and government to resign, while the opposition is trying to have him recalled - while at the same time he is at the center of at least two other investigations. Tonight, best reports say he remains in Guatemala- where he told Prime Minister Dean Barrow he would be seeking treatment for crushing migraine headaches. He still has not given the Prime Minister any answer on whether he will or won't resign - though he has been sending texts to members of the Cayo Northeast Committee saying he plans to go back to his people, which, observers say, will be quite a feat without cover from his party.
But, as we've speculated, Penner might just play stubborn and stick around a bit. And, why not? He's got more than a hundred thousand reasons to stay in the House of Representatives, even if he does get kicked across the floor behind the PUP's. How do we get that number? Well, as an elected Area Representative, Penner will continue to collect fifty two thousand dollars per year. And then, Area Representatives, all of them, PUP and UDP, get eighty four thousand dollars a year, or seven thousand dollars a month to spend on their constituency, three thousand of which is supposed to be spent to rent a divisional office.
But, there's a very low standard for reporting on and accounting for spending that money, and, over time, we've learned that a lot of the representatives - especially if they aren't in government - just pocket it on the understanding that it will go back to the people anyway in small donations and assistance here and there. May sound shocking, but it's true - and in Penner's case, if he were to stick around as a representative, one without a political future in the UDP or PUP, he could collect a cool 136 thousand dollars annually in government cheese for three and a half more years, basically for doing very little - if anything at all. Penner does not, as far as we know, have his own enterprise to sustain himself.
That's one scenario - and one not without its appeal, but there are mixed messages coming out of Penner-land - and so, we'll just have to wait and see what he does.
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