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Last night on the news, you saw Senator Eamon Courtenay explaining why the Senate’s appointment of Net Vasquez as accountant for the Integrity Commission has to be rescinded.  Courtney argues that Vasquez is not a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants because his certificate of membership has expired.  Today Net Vasquez responded to that criticism:…

Nestor Vasquez - Accountant, Integrity Commission
“Certificate I provided when the cabinet asked for a resume is this one. It’s dated January 1st 1985 okay and this certificate if you can look it carefully and show me an expiration date, if you can find one show it to me, it has none okay. I have remained a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Belize without any interruption. The internal arose when I was given the post of executive chairman at Belize Telemedia, I no longer needed a practicing certificate so I did not apply to have a practicing certificate. I closed my office okay, I discharged my staff with their compensation, I have no clients, I haven’t been practicing then but I remained a member a of the Institute of Chartered Accountants.â€￾

“It says clearly in this letter written a few days ago signed by the president of the institute. Our records indicate that since 2010 you’re practicing licenses with the institute was not renewed. We did not get nay further feedback from you whether you would renew your license that is practice or remain a regular member in good standing. That’s a different point okay, I remained a member but you want to be in good standing it tells you here what to do.â€￾

“My membership is not interrupted it’s only that I no longer required a practicing certificate. I have here a certificated that was granted yesterday which certifies that I am a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in good standings. And it says here in this letter, says here very clearly, this is a certificate of good standing with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Belize and it says here than you for updating your status. So I was always there, it just needed to update, it proves I was always a member. Courtenay tries to make out that I was no longer a member is totally wrongs, its saying he wrongly assumed. He doesn’t know when he is right from when he is wrong.â€￾

And while much has been made of the fact that the Institute of Chartered Accountants nominated Warren Coye as its choice for an accountant – and government apparently rejected that selection in favour of faithful UDP Net Vasquez, there’s another side to that story.

7News has learnt that the letter from the Institute nominating Coye went to the Prime Minister on November 11th. This was one month after the Institute’s President wrote to the Chamber President saying that they do have members who are interested in doing the job.  But, while we are told the institute made a verbal commitment to provide those names by the following week in October – they instead waited a month before sending a single name. Â 

By then, the Prime Minister’s office says it was out of time, and forced to move ahead because the PM had committed to the teachers that he would appoint the Integrity Commission by November 14th.  That process included writing to the Leader of the Opposition for his nominees, and no objection on government’s nominees and getting the Governor General to sign.  And what’s more the letter from the institute ended up at the National Assembly which did not send it to the PM’s office until November 17th – beyond the deadline.