But nothing is being examined more closely than the days ahead. As said at the top, everything has changed and who didn’t know that on May 16th knows it tonight. The enormity of the crimes and the potential for violence of this literally cannot be overstated; it is the kind of thing that happens in countries like Israel, Iraq and formerly Ireland. But now it’s over here – except there is no holy war, no infidels, only Belizeans and a new type of urban terror. The police and the Prime Minister discussed the new operational and legislative measures that will be taken to contain this urban terror.
Hon. Dean Barrow, Prime Minister
“There will have to be new legislation passed to deal with this grenade phenomenon and to deal with the fact that possession of a grenade or the facilitation of another’s possession of a grenade has to be seen now as a kind of urban terrorism type feature of the criminal lifestyle and in terms of penalties, in the terms of question of bail, in terms of the drafting of offenses that will reflect where the society seems to be headed - clearly all that must be done by the government.”
Gerald Westby, Commissioner of Police
“We will enforce even more for the remainder of the celebrations, the parade on the 10th and the 21st. I have already spoken to the Commander
of the BDF when he came in and the Chief of Staff and we will be getting, securing additional BDF to place at key and strategic locations along the parade. We’re also going to be getting the BDF’s Explosive Ordinance Team, instead of calling them when we need them, we will be having them here like what we do for presidential visits, VIP visits. They will secure and clear the venues and then we will sterilize it and make sure adequate police are there. But again we need the public’s support like what we’ve been having. We’ve gotten a number of video recordings from out there, people are cooperating.”
Crispin Jeffries,
“We’ll be moving into a new level. What the public will be seeing leading up to the next two major events will be a different style of sweeping our streets and clearing certain areas before a parade passes. We will follow our parade with possibly a bus to take those we believe may pose a threat because we want Belizeans to understand that we have been trained and we are equipped to respond proportionately. However, we need for Belizeans to understand that we need information from you so that you can be assisted in providing your own safety and security.
As the Prime Minister rightly said, there is a concern for security on the 21st, there will be thousands of primary, secondary school students in that parade and I am certain that the assurances at this table cannot be given and repeated enough to make people feel a sense of safety so it is in this light that I would like to urge those persons who can influence persons or person in possession of these items to let them know they are changing the image of a country, a very peaceful loving country, and we need for them to come back to the drawing board with us and let us work things differently.”
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“Without wishing to alarm people more than they are already alarmed, the short answer to your question is yes this is a new phenomenon and all of us have to act accordingly.”
As for the tenth September parade, the Prime Minister confirmed that he will march – and will do so confidently with the news security measures in place.
