And while the Bar has managed to settle its conflicts, internal and external, for the circulation of this position paper, the hot-button issue going into Wednesday’s consultation is the issue of mineral rights. By the terms of the amendment – the Constitution will ensure that oil and mineral deposits are the property of the people and government of Belize and not the landowner. That’s what’s in the existing law anyway, but Marshalleck says it’s something else that sticks in the Barr’s throat.
Jacqueline Marshalleck,
“You stand to lose the ability to go to court to have your rights, concerning your property, if it involves minerals, petroleum, and accompanying substances – you lose your right to go to court to have those interests determined and you lose your right to any compensation that you may have been entitled to with respect to petroleum, minerals, and accompanying substances. I think as we indicated in the paper, government is ensuring that the petroleum mineral rights and accompanying substances are for the government, for the people of Belize, and that is something we support. In fact the current Mines and Minerals Act already says minerals are for the government, the current Petroleum Act already says that petroleum is for the government. So by placing it in the constitution they are not bringing in anything new, that is something that they are just putting into the highest law in the land.
What is the problem if you agree with in this way is that it is almost rewriting history because it is saying that these things will be deemed always to have been the property of the government of Belize. So from time immemorium, these things will be deemed to have always belonged to the government and rights, which are the rights of access to the courts for the determination of those rights and compensation, will not apply with respect to those items.”
Click Here for the Bar Association’s full position paper.
