Prime Minister Briceno Dismisses Rumors of Early General Elections, Clarifies Budget Allocation

Prime Minister John Briceno has clarified the viral narrative that elections will be called before the next budget reading. The conclusion was drawn after the supplementary budget that went to the Senate on Monday included a line item for the general elections in the sum of 343 thousand dollars. According to PM Briceno, he said that people are making much ado about nothing. While he did not indicate when the general elections would come, he did say that the line item in the budget was for the Toledo East bi-election.

John Briceño, Prime Minister of Belize: “Basically the $300,000, remember we had a by-election in July and we did not present a supplementary budget to be able to pay for it so we had to use other resources. So we’re paying back the monies from what we did, I think we advanced monies to Elections and Boundaries and now we’re replacing the monies that were used for the elections.  And I know the UDP wants us to get them out of their misery by calling an election so that then they could try to decide who is going to be the next leader. But we are going to call elections when we believe it’s the right time. I said it’s going to be in 2025. There’s still a lot of work, as I pointed out in my presentation, thanking the Belizean people for that awesome mandate that they gave us and it’s something that we take very seriously. We’ve done a lot, but there’s a lot more work to do and when we’re saying that we have reduced poverty by half that does not mean that everybody is rich, we still have a long way to go and that’s what that’s the case that we’re trying to do. And we’re finding ways to fight inflation in many different ways. Many of the items that people are buying don’t pay taxes that comes from abroad and so the prices go up,  the retailers have to raise their prices. So what do we do? We try to see income tax, education, NHI, house lots, mortgages, all this bring a little bit of money you know from all over and then continue to push to grow the economy, to continue to create opportunities for Belizeans and encourage people to start their own businesses.”

While the Prime Minister says he won’t be making any early announcements on the next elections, the PUP’s Chairman Henry Charles Usher says the party is battle-ready. Today, Usher weighed in on the PM’s decision and the rumors that circulated. 

Henry Charles Usher, PUP Chairman: “The PUP is ready for elections whenever the Prime Minister is ready to call those elections. I think that as you know we went through our convention process, we have team 31 in place. We are getting all of the campaigners and computer operators etc ready and that’s what we’re working on right now so when the Prime Minister says let’s go we’re ready to go.” 

Reporter: But as the party’s chairman don’t you think it would be maybe opportune or a strategic move to hold the elections maybe before March next year ? 

Henry Charles Usher, PUP Chairman: “I leave strategy up to the Prime Minister but certainly whenever he says Chairman it’s time for us to go to the polls we’ll be ready.”

It is to be noted that the line item was described as ‘general elections’ and not a bi-election.