The Immigration Department has been out of passports for some time but now they’re here, and more than just new, they are re-designed. This morning the CARICOM Belize passport was launched. It’s bigger, brighter, and has greater security features. The launch was held this morning at the George Price Center in Belmopan where Director Gareth Murrillo discussed the changes and enhancements and Minister of National Security Carlos Perdomo spoke about the significance of the change. Here’s the story.
This is the new Belize CARICOM passport. The most noticeable change is that a CARICOM logo is now on the front cover alongside Belize’s coat of arms.
Gareth Murillo, Director of Immigration
“All covers bare gold bonding, gold text of the CARICOM logo, of the words Caribbean Community, of the Belize Coat of Arms, and the designation of the type of passport that it is. On the inside of the front cover we have a guilloche printed background, a guilloche is just a pattern of wavy lines. We have intaglio or raised printing which is printing which you can feel which is accessible to the touch, of the national symbols of Belize. There you will see the mahogany tree, the toucan, the black orchid and the tapir.
On the bio data page, again going on with our nationalism and patriotism, we have a colour shifting image of the text sub umba floreo, it is magnified just below where my text is there. Just beneath the machine readable zone we also have a double wave in pink and blue of the text Belize. These images then form a larger image of the word Belize as you can see in blue against the pink background.
On the inner pages again there is that same guilloche printing, this time it has a rainbow effect which goes from yellow and green to blue and purple. On every page there is an image of a mahogany tree and the bottom of every page there is also images of fishes swimming along the barrier reef. There varying images on each page of the image just below the mahogany tree. It varies from the black orchid to the toucan to the tapir. There are images of the district maps in an alphabetical sequence of eight pages per district.
On the inside of the back cover again we have intaglio printing but this time in cursive of the words Belize. When viewed from a particular distance it may just look like a wavy or a snaking image but it actually spells out Belize. There is also an intaglio print of the map of the Caribbean and also of the Central America SICA regions and we have a flag superimposed on the country outline.”
This morning Minister of National Security Carlos Perdomo was the first Belizean to receive one of the new passports – which he says are symbolic.
Hon. Carlos Perdomo, Minister of National Security
“The Belize Caricom passport is therefore a very important symbol of regionalism and visible proof of a common regional identity. But it remains a fully national document and has no impact on our Belizean sovereignty. This new passport is a part of measures aimed at promoting hassle free travel for Caricom nationals within the region. It is intended that Belize Caricom passport will create awareness that we are an integral part of the regional Caribbean Community as well as of being uniquely a Belizean citizen.”
The Ministry of National Security’s CEO General Lloyd Gillett and Commandant of the Coast Guard Cedric Borland also received new passports. The old machine readable passports are still valid however those with passports issued prior to 2005 are encouraged to apply for one of the new passports.
There are also new fees of note: it will be $50 for a new passport which will be valid for ten years. It will cost you $85 to replace a lost passport and $100 to get it in express time. The Immigration Department warns that there is a backlog dating back to November and so it might take some for applications to be processed.
