The situation out in the Port of Belize remains at a stalemate tonight with ships having to either remain idle in harbour, turn back, or go to Big Creek to be unloaded.
According to a notice to shippers from PBL's CEO, Andy Lane, the Belize Port Authority met with the Christian Workers Union this morning at BPA's headquarters. In the statement, Lane said he hoped that the port would be back in operation at least by midday.
But at 11:30 this morning, the CWU president, Evan "Mose" Hyde told us that there were no updates to report as yet. We are told he had to meet with their attorney before going back to relay the message to their membership.
In Lane's statement, he details what the next steps would look like once they returned back to work, and the ships that would need to be unloaded or reloaded first. However, that didn't happen today and for some ships, like the Oslo Bulk 4, which contains fertilizing material, they just have to sit it out and wait because they cannot go to Big Creek.
And many others are in the same situation, waiting for their supplies and commodities that are stuck on the ships. For shipping companies, that has translated to a world of stress. One freight service, Belizean Queen Freight, took to Facebook to tell their customers that the vessel carrying their January 10th containers had to return to the US on the 24th. That means that that shipment will not be able to clear customs until at least the week of February 7th.
Additionally, no other vessels will be able to sail or dock this week. And even if the issue is sorted out this week, Belizean Queen Freight says it will create a backlog of supplies that the country needs, which will lead to a delay in deliveries in the second week of February.
The stevedores, however, had hoped to get a verdict out of today's meetings at 6pm. We'll keep following to let you know.
