The Public Service Union has spoken up for the Customs Department. A release sent out on Friday complained about the comments made by Minister Ralph Fonseca on Wednesday night's newscast.
The release says that the Customs workers and the PSU are gravely concerned about the statements Fonseca made when he said Customs if the biggest revenue leak, and referred to a corrupt clique off officers. The union calls on the Minister to retract the statement and apologize publicly. But if that's what the PSU and the Customs had to say to the Minister of Home Affairs, we don't know what they'll say to the Prime Minister after he again singled-out Customs for revenue loss, this time in his budget speech. Here are his remarks.
Said Musa, Prime Minister
"We have also engaged our international partners and particularly the IDB which has a mission in Belize this week dealing with best practices in both revenue and expenditure management to assist us in improving our revenue collection in all areas, particularly the Customs Department. And here we have to be frank and open with our people, it is a belief shared by our government and all our social partners that millions of dollars in revenue that we desperately need to implement our proper policies are lost because people corruptly evade paying taxes."
Customs is government's biggest revenue collector.
