And, Arthurs will be a part of implementing plan Belize which calls for four thousand police officers or 1% of the population. We asked if that is realistic:
Hon. Kareem Musa, Minister of Home Affairs
"I can tell you that we have currently have 109 officers that are positive and 115 that are awaiting their test results and so we are understaffed especially now in Covid, but even moving forward it is not like Covid will be with us forever. Our financial state will not be in the mud forever. We will bounce back as a country. It will take come time but I foresee that whenever it is we do rebound and we do bounce back that getting this pledge fulfilled is something that I am very serious about increasing the ranks and we mentioned it on the last occasion of doing it incrementally. Obviously it won't be 4,000 officers one lick, but perhaps taking it up to 3,000 within a year I think is a reasonable thing to expect."
Jules Vasquez
"How will you pay their salaries?"
Hon. Kareem Musa, Minister of Home Affairs
"Like I said we are not going to be in Covid forever, so we will get out of this."
In the over-policed United States there are 700 thousand police officers, which is.25% of the population.
