Last night on 7NEWS, Mayor Zenaida Moya discussed a letter she had sent to her councilor Mark King on Tuesday admonishing him for repeated absences from council meetings and basically threatening to unseat him for missing those meetings. But 24 hours after that has been sent, she told us that all beef between her and King had been squashed. Today Councilor King came to our office to confirm that, "yes" he was absent 7 times, 4 of them consecutively. But there's an explanation. Here is his.
Mark King, Belize City Councilor
"The council meetings that I have missed, I have called into the council. Maybe I did not get through to the Mayor or her secretary but I got to somebody else and maybe they did not pass on that information. The letter, maybe the tone of the letter was an oversight but I thought that maybe the Mayor should have called me in and asked my I missed those meetings.
Yes I missed four consecutive meetings, that is what the Act says you should be asked about. In those cases, those were all emergencies. For two of them I had chicken pox and I am sure the Council wouldn't want me to go there all bumpyed up and everything so I kind of laughed at that one. One of them I was out of the country and the other one, my son was really really sick and as a good father I wanted to stay home and take care of my child.
So I have no remorse for that. I am answerable to the public and so I think that it was good that the Mayor did to some extent and brought it forward and asked me why I missed some of the meetings.
I spoke to the Deputy Mayor. Myself and the Deputy Mayor went into the Mayor's office and we had a very nice conversation with the Mayor and she said if that was the case, it is okay and just to ensure that next time the people that you call give me a call and so I asked her if I could have her number and that is the way we worked that out.
I have absolutely no problem with the Mayor, so to speak, in terms of our relationship and we working together and the Council working together. I must differ on issues whereby it comes to issues within the City Council. I know there is a little terminology that Mark King likes to give trouble. I am not a trouble maker."
Keith Swift,
So you think the Mayor shouldn't have written that letter or at least worded it the way it was?
Mark King,
"Yeah definitely. I thought it was an oversight. I thought she was misinformed and I thought she did not have the right information so she went to the extent of making the letter by not completely hearing the entire story. But when I met with her and the deputy, it was so easy to understand."
Today Mayor Moya was scheduled to hold a meeting with the 6 resigning managers but we were unable to find out how that went. Right now those managers are meeting with the UDP Central Party Council at UDP headquarters.
