26 JAN
2014
9 LIVES??
Castro Hustles,
Barrow Forgives Again Belize City, January 22, 2014 Over $42,000 siphoned from the account of the Belize Airport Authority, a Government-run Department, was wrongfully and possibly criminally dished out to UDP Minister Edmund Castro, members of his family or to the embattled UDP area representative for supposed political purposes. To everyone’s shock, Prime Minister Dean Barrow defended Castro’s latest scandal with all his might and with a twisted tongue, after the Opposition Leader Hon. Francis Fonseca lashed out at the level of corruption that exists under his
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THE BELIZE TIMES
Kenworth Tillett has to explain the abuse of public funds
administration. According to Barrow, “it is distasteful and wrong...but it’s NOT corruption” and so no offense was committed, in his almighty opinion. Castro has become a radioactive UDP politician, emanating much more than whiffs of poor judgment and a lack of discretion, but Barrow has chosen to protect him time and time again. In 2010, Castro was kicked out of Cabinet after the Prime Minister received convincing evidence of him being involved in a land hustle. Castro was forgiven quickly and welcomed back into the fold in time for the early general elections called in 2012. Since being returned to office, Castro has not changed his stripes and instead stepped up his debacles a couple notches. In late 2013, the Prime Minister confirmed reports of complaints from Taiwan that Castro had made unwelcome sexual advances on a female Taiwanese protocol officer during his official visit to that country. Like the land hustle allegations, Castro denied the report, of course. The Prime Minister didn’t investigate it. Then came the bombshell allegation that Castro was neck deep in a visa hustle. Whistleblower Alvarine Burgess said that Castro charged $2,000 for every visa he got, using his Ministerial authority for over 200 Chinese nationals. Burgess said she was the link between the Chinese nationals and Castro, and she was the one who handled the payments to Castro. Instead of dealing with Castro appropriately, Barrow has protected him. He has also described growing evidence that other UDP Ministers are involved in similar visa facilitations as not even “remotely a smoking gun”. This latest scandal in which Castro finds himself was initially exposed by the BELIZE TIMES in late December 2013, and further investigated and exposed to the public in the New Year. It disclosed Castro’s use of the Belize Airport Authority funds as a personal and political piggy bank. A minister of Government cannot have personal access to public funds. It’s even worst that the Government department under question falls under the Ministry for which Castro has some level of authority as the Minister of State. The cheques exposed by the BELIZE TIMES showed Cas-
tro being paid three cheques totaling $10,056.55 by the Airport Authority. When questioned by other media houses, the Airport Authority General Manager Kenworth Tillett claimed that there was nothing wrong with the cheque as it was approved by the Board. One of the cheques, for $4,000, was a donation to Castro to assist in the burial of his mother, Tillett claimed. But there were more cheques. Almost $2,500 paid to Jafari and Ionie Castro, who are Castro’s son and wife. Then there are other cheque payments, totaling almost $23,000, made out to businesses such as Caribbean Chicken, Bowen and Bowen, The Dental Center, Ordonez Bike Shop and two funeral homes, for private services received by Castro or persons connected to Castro. And then, there are the cheques paid to various schools. What does the Airport Authority have to do with schools? Absolutely nothing! Except in this case, Castro was so facey to use the Authority’s funds to pay for school fees for families of his political supporters in Belize Rural North. Castro who gets a Ministerial salary and perks of over $100,000 and who receives a community fund of almost $5,000 monthly, must explain why he needed to dip his hands into funds belonging to a Government department to feed his political adventures in his constituency. In any functioning democracy, a public officer or politician found doing this kind of hustling would be fired, arrested, prosecuted for exploiting public funds and banned from ever holding public office. But Belize’s democracy, justice and the rule of law are held in a straightjacket by Dean Barrow and the UDP. It is only released and made to function against Belizeans and members of the Opposition or any entity that goes against the UDP Government. Dean Barrow has chosen to play a dangerous political game in which he is taking all of us Belizeans for fools.
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