And Cristina Coc gave us an update on their negotiations with the government on the implementation of the CCJ Consent Order. She says they've come to a stalemate because they outright reject the government's proposal. Here's why.
Cristina Coc, Spokesperson, MLA
"To put it bluntly, negotiations between the government of Belize and the Maya people have reached a stalemate. The Maya land tenure policy and the draft bill, in our view, continues to fall short of the effective orders of the court."
"It continues to fall short of international standards and of the constitutional protections afforded to the Maya people. The main issue in, of contention is how to determine where Maya customary land tenure exists."
"The government wants to use a formula of five acres per person for automatic recognition. We reject this formula because it is inconsistent with our cultural patterns of land use, and it limits the land that we use and occupy."
"The government says that if we want the rest of our land, the rest that we use beyond these five acres, we have to prove thirty years continuous use to the exclusion of third parties. We reject this proposal."
"It has been thirty years that we have been back and forth to prove to multiple courts our use and occupation. The court found in our favor, and now the government wants us to do this all over again, and if we could have kept the third parties off, we would have done so."
"But the government is the one who gave away our lands. This is not consistent with the judgment or with international standards or with our constitutional rights. The government wants us to give up our rights to areas where it has been declared a national protected area."
"We vehemently reject this proposal."
We'll keep following the story.
