When will Belize have a DNA lab? When the Prime Minister was Leader of the Opposition, here’s what he said: The UDP government will set up within the first six months of taking office, a DNA unit at the National Forensics Lab....surely we can find the half a million dollars that's necessary to establish the DNA facility." Well we’re going for one year and six months of his taking office and there’s no lab in sight – in fact it’s not even being discussed. We put that to the PM yesterday and he was, flatly, stumped for an answer.
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“Well, at that time there was not the kind of….”
Jules Vasquez,
You’re weren’t in government.
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“That is also true but that is not what I was going to say. At that time there was not the kind of cash crunch, there was not the kind of world economic and financial crisis that we’ve been experiencing. That is not to suggest that we have not spent far more than the monies that would have been necessary initially to establish the lab on various other programs designed to see us intervene socially effectively and design to deal with law and order. The amount of money we’ve spent on CYDP, there is the Belize City rejuvenation project that is in fact to be funded to the tune of $5 million as I had announced. We are taking a quarter of a million dollars off the top giving that to CYDP for training.”
