San Jose Palmar Village Elects New Lands Committee

Four new members were elected to the lands committee for San Jose Palmar Village, Orange Walk District.  The elections were held yesterday with a voter turnout of eighty-four percent.  It is an event held every three years where the descendants of the village’s founders elect a new committee to oversee decisions made on the use and distribution of the village land.  San Jose Palmar Village has a unique history regarding its land use that dates back to 1936.  Initially, the Indians occupied an area known as San Jose, but they were forcibly removed from their homes by Belize Estate and Company.  As a result, Britain granted them the lands now known as the Nuevo San Jose Palmar with the understanding that only descendants of the original settlers would inherit the land.  In the end, the slate comprising Christopher Contreras, Eder Ortega, Kimberly Pol, and Wincy Perez was successful.  According to Perez, it is a victory that will give them an opportunity to effect change. 

Wincy Perez, Member, San Jose Palmar Lands Committee: “My name is Wincy Perez,.”

Reporter: Tell us about today’s victory and what it represents to the community of San Jose Palmar.

Wincy Perez, Member, San Jose Palmar Lands Committee: “This is a big victory for us because we are all youths trying to make a difference for our village, our descendants and we’ve been forgotten so we are coming and pledging our transparency and accountability to all our descendants doing our reports. So the process was hard, during the day we had ups and downs but at the end of the day we managed everybody pulling their strings and waited to reach our big W tonight.”

Reporter: This is the first time you guys are participating in such an event ? 

Wincy Perez, Member, San Jose Palmar Lands Committee: “For me no. I have been in the past ones that I was in village council too. Actually the current village council so this elections we know more or less how we go during the day to achieve our goal at the end of the day. All who participated are descendants and bloodlines from the old people that come from the San Jose so once you’re a descendant and you have one year living in the village you can be entitled to vote in today’s election. We think well our main goal is to go in there and clear the stats that are in there and we will report to our people constantly and giving what they will hand over to us, so we will be auditing a good audit and giving our people a good report.” 

Reporter: Is that the first thing you are going to do ? 

Wincy Perez, Member, San Jose Palmar Lands Committee: “Yes that’s our main goal, first one, a good audit and then pass it on to our people from there to see what we get from this past committee coming out and then we move forward from there.”

The Lands Committee is made up of seven members; the four who were elected yesterday and three others to be appointed by the government as trustees.