Meb Cutlack
The Reporter (Belize)
June 15, 2001

The Chalillo dam debate has been subjected to the full force of the government media focused on trying to discredit all or anyone who dares to question the folly of the original Mollejon dam or the continuing folly of Chalillo.

Democracy can be defined as: “government in which the people hold the ruling power directly or through elected representatives.” We in Belize can no longer qualify as living in a democracy – under this or any other definition of the word.

The people of Belize are subject to the direct rule of The Cabinet and even this, by the enormous and possibly unconstitutional power of the minister in charge of finance, is illusionary. Belize has become a virtual two man dictatorship.

To quote the editorial from last week´s Reporter commenting on the PUP´s lame fulfillment of its promise of electoral reform: “It is revealing but profoundly depressing that any party in government could hold the intelligence of its electorate in such low esteem that it would put forward these proposals as serious constitutional reform measures. The editorial added: “It is a gross exaggeration to suggest that the changes will give effect to recommendations of the Political Reform Commission when so many of the Commission’s key criticisms ( such as the use of Statutory Instruments to create law and the emasculation of the House of Representatives by the Cabinet) are so blatantly ignored.”

So much for the PUP´s elaborate false promises of electoral reform given prior to the election in 1998. In Belize today it is no longer a case of government for, by or of the people, but government VERSUS the people.

As for the promised reform of the Senate, to change it from a body which merely rubber-stamps cabinet´s decisions into a body with independent power, the Prime Minister´s own words on Channel 5 reveal exactly the truth: “Under these proposed amendments, the number of senators are increased from eight to eighteen as follows: ten are to be appointed on the advice of the Prime Minister, who is to ensure that of that ten at least one comes from each of the six districts. Four are appointed on the advice of the leader of the opposition. And most importantly, four are appointed under the Belize Council of Churches and other church organizations, the National Trade Union Congress, the Civil Society Steering Committee and the private sector, respectively.” Prime Minister Said Musa might well have added: “But we, the Cabinet, will, by our built-in majority, continue to rule exactly as we like.”

The most striking (and weekly) reminder of the absolute power of the small clique who now run Belize is the power which they have over almost all the media – the newspapers, television and radio in Belize. Yes! The Guardian is free, The Reporter is free, but they are kept poor by the simple method of denying them nearly all government advertising revenue while providing generous advertising funds and even subventions to their own media and those sections of the media which, while supposedly free, slavishly toe the government line.

The question which Belizeans must ask is, why and how can any government in power dish out lavish advertising to its party mouthpieces while denying that same advertising to the independent and opposition media? These are public funds being used for PUP purposes. The true answer is that this policy, indulged in by both the PUP and the UDP, must be ILLEGAL. Either all government advertising should be submitted to ALL the media for FREE publication or all government advertising MUST be distributed to ALL the media and paid for accordingly.

The overpowering control which the government has on the media means that the Belizean people are subjected to a totally biased view of government actions and reactions, of present and pending legislation, of the infringement of law and other misdemeanors by government and also, almost every day, the truth about government policies

There is no more classic illustration of this than the Chalillo dam debate with the full force of the government media focused on trying to discredit all or anyone who dares to question the folly of the original Mollejon dam or the continuing folly of Chalillo. The technique of the government, through its media, is to colour ANY critic of Chalillo as an interfering foreigner being paid from abroad. Take this recent diatribe from The Belize Times: “We are witnessing a very dangerous trend taking place where organizations with their very own foreign policies, are showing a total lack of respect for our national sovereignty and environmental laws. They have been encouraged by their own kind within our midst as well as a few local pawns showing up as tokens in their attempts to frustrate our growth and to manipulate our future.” In other words, if you criticize Chalillo you are somehow ‘unBelizean’, acting against Belize and, quite unbelievably, the government even sug! gests that these critics of Chalillo (whose whole raison d’etre is environmental protection) are lacking “respect” for Belize´s “environmental laws”.

At least this statement from government acknowledges that critics to Chalillo do exist within Belize – which is better than the BEL Chief Executive officer, Lynn Young, saying while in Canada that there were no critics of Chalillo in Belize. Well, in Mr. Young´s defence. he does have his $300,000 annual salary to defend! There is little or no excuse for the following drivel from The Belize Times: “In spite of the much better financing of the anti-dam crew there are a few patriots like Norris Hall who are fighting the good fight to inform the world that the Chalillo Dam is an economically feasible source for cheap, renewable energy with virtually no negative environmental impact.” I don´t doubt Norris´s patriotism (even considering the fact that he is receiving a very large salary from government) but I totally disagree with the assertion that Chalillo is an “economically feasible source for cheap, renewable energy with virtually no negative environmental impact.”

The Chalillo dam is NOT , as EXPERT after EXPERT has testified, either economically feasible, a potential source of cheap electricity or without environmental impact. It is this bunch of lies that government keeps pushing that reveals exactly the extent of the fraud being perpetrated against the true interests of all Belizeans – even the as yet unborn, for they too will inherit the enormous burden of debt caused by the stupidity of placing hydro dams on a river which runs almost dry in the dry season and which, in some years, has hardly any rainfall at all. And of course the cost of the inevitable increase of pollution of both the Macal River and the Belize River is incalculable.

The Mollejon dam on the Macal River was a gross stupidity built against all expert advise at the time. It was promoted and pushed through by our present minister in charge of finance. Chalillo is no more than a further afront to logic to try and prove that he was right and also because there is a lot of money in and around dams. The Vaca dam which follows Chalillo will be the same story, and by then Belizeans will have some $250,000,000 to $300,000,000 dollars to pay back over the next 30 years at an astronomical 12% to 15% interest rate – and they STILL won´t have cheap electricity, just a billion dollar debt!

To suggest that such a truth is unpatriotic or contrary to Belize´s environmental laws is patently ridiculous. I suggest that the real motive of government, as they continually slander critics of the dam, is to lay the groundwork for trying to get Chalillo underway as soon as possible. Don´t be surprised to see the government´s tame environmental appointees give a nod to Chalillo any day soon! The government does not want to wait for full surveys covering more comprehensive geological investigation, they don´t want to wait for the complete environmental report, and they don´t want to allow time for fuller study of the number of important Mayan ruins and Mayan caves which will be flooded and lost forever when Chalillo is built.

It is time the people of Belize asked themselves who indeed are the true patriots: those who, for reasons of greed and personal gain – through construction, exclusive cement deals and other familar perks – want this uneconomic but potentially profitable folly or those who stand against it purely on environmental and economic grounds. The answer, my friends, is as clear as the waters of the Macal – before the Mollejon dam was constructed!