As we reported last night, there was politically motivated violence in the northern village of Nuevo San Juan after the village council elections. That is a village where the PUP won all seven seats reversing what had been a UDP gain in the 2007 village council election. Which side started it? Well, both the UDP and PUP are blaming each other but the UDP victims – one of whom fractured her leg – were the first to go to police. They made a complaint immediately after being treated for their wounds and as a consequence, the PUP villagers they named were arrested and charged for harm and wounding. They described some of their injuries to our friends at Channel 10 in Orange Walk.
Juan Osorio, Beaten
“We were sitting, we were sad because we loosed and a multitude of PUPs reached and they started to fight with the UDPs, I tried to controlled them, I wasn’t drunk. The PUPs were drinking from early morning. I went to calm a guy by the name Javier when I felt someone hit me with a stick, he burst my head and I fell to the ground unconscious. My uncle Juan Blanco and his son started to kick me while I was on the ground.”
Gabriela Osorio, Wife of Juan
“Raul Witsil came, grabbed me and pushed me and I fell to the ground, I couldn’t get up and that’s when they hit my husband on his head.”
Question,
“When you fell what happened to you?”
Gabriela Osorio,
“I fractured my foot when he pushed me.”
And while their complaints have been acted upon, there’s been no such action in the case of the counter complainants made by the PUP supporters who were in the fight. Commissioner of Police Crispin Jeffries today told the media that Orange Walk Police are looking closely at those complaints because the complainants came in, quote, “with injuries that appeared to be recent.” They went in on Monday afternoon, and the fight happened on Sunday, so it’s not clear what qualifies as recent or how police are able to discern the difference between recent and very recent. He said police are also investigating reports of damage to property resulting form the fights.
As for the drinking which spawned this entire ruckus, Jeffries pointed out that there are no laws or statutory instrument passed to restrict public drinking during polling hours for village council elections. He did concede though that public drinking is illegal – and both camps say there was plenty of that happening. Jeffries says special measures will be taken this weekend as elections continue in Orange Walk North.
