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And the Senate will soon be joined by a 13th. Senator.   Yesterday, the NGO community nominated 7 persons to be senators; 6 have accepted the nomination.  They are: Pablo Collado – he’s a popular flutist, but he is nominated by his organization called, “Adopt a Child With A Disabilityâ€￾

Janelle Chanona, the OCEANA Vice President has accepted the nomination. 

Edilberto Romero, from another conservation NGO called Bacongo has also accepted the nomination. 

Osmany Salas, who is the president of BTIA has also accepted. 

Donovan Reneau, a popular radio DJ and visually impaired advocate, has been nominated by the Belize Council for the Visually Impaired. 

And Valdemar Andrade, the Executive Director of the Turneffe Atoll Sustainability Association has also accepted the nomination. 

So the next step is that the Steering Committee will vet the candidates based on the requirements established at their meeting in November of last year.  Â As we’ve reported, that includes, that the nominee must be a Belizean who does not have allegiance to another country; they must have three plus years working with an NGO in Belize; they must demonstrate prior knowledge of legislative, constitutional issues as well as matters affecting NGOs; they must possess excellent communication skills, both written and oral;  they must be non-partisan: and not be a partisan political activist overtly involved in getting a party/candidate elected. 

The NGO’s will now meet in two days where the voting process will be finalized. The Senator will then be elected on January 10th, 2017. The name of the 13th Senator nominee will be submitted to the Governor General by January 17th.