And from CIB's complaints against the state for the raid and the seizure of their money, we now turn to the Prime Minister's views on another foreign investor who could become an adversary of his government in the near future.
September 14th was the deadline for Belizeans to submit their views on the proposed cruise terminal and bulk storage facility upgrade, which Waterloo - an Ashcroft-Allied company - wants to build at the Port of Belize. That deadline was a little over a month ago, and since then, there's been no update on the next step of the assessment from the National Environmental Appraisal Committee. So yesterday, we asked the PM to discuss that matter in the context of his government's pending National Ports Policy. Here's that conversation:
Hon. John Briceno, Prime Minister
"Honestly it's not in limbo. Waterloo, they believe that they have a very important investment to do in Belize. But to us what is important to us as a government is that we must follow the law. We must follow the process and that applies for somebody that's inventing 1 million to one thats investing 300 million and we made that abundantly clear to the investors at Waterloo, that we're not going to cut corners, because even if we were to attempt to do so, other people are going to sue and its going to end up in court. So, its best that we do it right and we are going to abide by what the EIA tells us and if the EIA says yes, it's a good project under whatever conditions, it will have the full support of the government. But if the EIA tells us that it should not be done for X, Y, Z then we as a government will abide by that."
Reporter
"Sir, but the matter is though that you have these 3 developers who wants to put a cruise port in Belize City in one or two mile radius, the environmental concerns has been look that is not feasible and there is no ports policy."
Hon. John Briceno, Prime Minister
"And we know that. We are working on a ports policy and the ports policy which we already have the first draft, it hasn't come to cabinet. It's supposed to come to cabinet very soon. But the point is though, for those that are involve in business and I am also involve in business, no sane businessman will put money where there are 3 big ports or 2 other ports. So if Port Magical were to start build their own port, I could guarantee you that Port of Belize they will not do it, because they will say well the numbers are not there, they're going to fail. The investors would not go and the same thing applies to Stake Bank. So a part of it has to be where the private sector decides which way to go as opposed to the government deciding well, oh this is the one that we want to build, because should we do that, then we are going to end up in court also. We need to follow the law. Once we follow the law of the land in Belize, we are going to be fine."
