The Belize Peace Movement is calling out Henry Charles Usher, the Minister of Public Service, Constitutional & Political Reform. They say that he was on TV last week and that he misinformed Belizeans about their redistricting lawsuit.
As viewers are aware, this citizen group has a pending court case against the Government in their attempts to force the government of the day to conduct a redistricting exercise of all the electoral divisions. They even attempted to block the November 2020 General Elections using the legal avenues afforded to them from their lawsuit.
In a press release from today, the BPM asserts that Usher made a guest appearance on the PUP's The WHIP Talk Show a week ago. According to the BPM, the Minister claimed that the redistricting case is currently in "abeyance" because the claimants failed to meet the court's deadlines for the filing of witness statements. According to the Peace Movement, the witness statements were submitted in time.
The BPM says, quote, "Had the Minister checked with the responsible attorneys at the Attorney General's Ministry, he would have learned the facts so he could more responsibly inform Cabinet and the wider public." End quote.
They also assert in that conversation on the talk show, Usher stated that a Redistricting exercise by the Elections and Boundaries Commission is now "in fulls swing!" The Peace Movement insists that the government's attorneys have mentioned nothing of this supposed redistricting and that they should have properly informed the court.
Recent weeks of negotiation between the attorneys for the two sides about a possible settlement of this lawsuit have been fruitless. The claimants have requested that the court set a date for trial.
