Today, the Minister of Indigenous People's Affairs expressed his concerns for the Alcalde's wellbeing - but also noted that the entire push to regularize communal land rights is at a pivotal juncture. Tensions are extremely high - and that area around Indian Creek is very volatile. He urged all parties to take what he called a path to peace:
Voice of: Dr Louis Zabaneh, Minister of Indigenous Peoples' Affairs
"Now this is matter for the police where we have the alcalde missing and we are hopeful that it would be resolved in a positive way but we don't know how that would turn out as yet, noh?"
"We can only hope that he is found alive and not harmed but that is going to unfold in the coming hours and hopefully sooner rather than later."
"Of course it is a very unfortunate to have that situation escalate to that point - if it is that this is related to the situation of contention between the two groups in the village."
"The police were in the village last night and all the reports we got included that the village council chairman's home was visited by opposing members of the village and that the Yax'che facility was also assaulted if you will by some angry villagers in the wee hours of this morning. Presently we understand that the police have taken the second alcalde and the chairman of the village to Punta Gorda for safety proposes as we were informed. And that the tension are still quite high."
"And we are appealing, we are appealing to all sides, to take a peaceful path."
"It's a police matter now - as you know we had responded to information that the alcalde was issuing certificates and demarcating, surveying out areas and giving out these certificates members of the village and from the ministry's side, we asked him to cease and desist because the only entity that can do the legally is the Ministry of Natural Resources."
"Let us work through this peacefully we're one country, one Belize and they are villagers, they live next to each other, they are family. So especially on the ground there that let us work through this peacefully and that while program has taken quite a long time, that in the past few months we were making visible progress that would get us hopefully to a resolution in the next few months."
