Tonight tensions remain high between the Toledo villages of Laguna and Yemeni Grove after a showdown on Sunday. Residents of both villages are accusing the other side of encroachment. The hostility is heightened because Yemeri is Creole and East Indian - while Laguna is a Maya village claiming customary land rights.
Tonight, the Belize Progressive Party is imploring the Government to urgently intervene in the ongoing boundary dispute. A release says, "Mediation can assist residents of both villages to be respectful of each other's land, but the residents need a long-term solution."
Appearing yesterday on Sunup via Zoom, the BPP's Will Maheia says successive government have failed to demarcate the boundary between the villages:
Wil Maheia, Belize Territorial Volunteers
"These two villages have existed for decades. Emery Grove, I know for a fact, have existed a lot longer than Laguna. But Laguna had come in later on. So I believe that if the government was serious, this just didn't blow up yesterday you know. Are they going to wait like what happened up north until when somebody died before they tried to do something, you know, when they could avoid all of this by just getting people together, sitting in and have respect for each other."
"You can't tell me that none of these, the history of these villages does not exist at the lands department or in the archives somewhere. Come on, these people were living there. Let's respect them. And on the other side, I have to really like give respect to the Mayans too, because they're making sure that nobody is coming into their area."
"At the same time, they also need to respect people who have historically lived in these areas for a long time and longer than a lot of them."
We'll keep following the story - but so far there has been no fiscal response from the government.
