Gwendolyn Lizarraga receives posthumous Order of Belize Award

Of the 25 awardees, 21were given meritorious awards; two received the Order of Belize, namely former US President, Jimmy Carter and the now deceased Belizean educator, Gwendolyn Lizarraga, and the order of distinction was given to Father Leo Weber of the Jesuit community.  Minister of the Public Service, Henry Charles Usher, explained that this event is an important part of the September celebrations, as it is a testament to how important the productive contributions of every citizen is.

Henry Charles Usher, Minister of Public Service: “I think that is important that you have persons from the education sector, from business, from sports, from academia, from tourism, from environmental protection, every aspect of Belizean life you are seeing being awarded tonight. There are actually 22 awards, orders for Meritorious Service, there is an Order of Distinction for Father Leo Weber and then there are two Orders of Belize awards tonight. The 39th President of the United States, Honorable Jimmy Carter is being awarded with the Order of Belize and our very own Madame Liz Postomusley is also being awarded the Order of Belize. So I’m very happy to be here to participate in this and I really want to congratulate all of the awardees. There is a awards committee that began meeting I guess earlier this year and then they get recommendations from around the country and they do the vetting process and they vet the candidates and they are the ones who make the selections. There are four levels of awards in the country. There’s the Meritorious Service, there’s the Order of Distinction, there is the Order of Belize and then the highest award that you can receive is the National Hero Award. There are two national heroes right now, the Right Honourable George Price and Honourable Philip Golson are the two national heroes. They are the only two persons who have been awarded the National Hero Award. The Order of Belize is the second highest award and really we reserve that award for really outstanding Belizians who have received, contributed to national development as well as international persons who have contributed to Belize’s independence they also received the Order of Belize. That’s why tonight, the former President of the United States, Jimmy Carter, is getting that award and I was happy to meet his daughter just now. She’s receiving the award on his behalf.”

The other awardees for this year were Lilia Bowman, Ignacia Herlinda Arana, Myrtle Palacio, Maria Chang, Nerita Pickwood, Jane Locario nee Melendrez, Claudette Hause, Anita Tzib, Ofelia Chiac, Eliza Arnold, Olga Gordon, Allan Miguel Sharp, Doctors Kevin and Kenneth Guerra, Eugenio Ah, Narciso Torres, Thomas Oliver, Walter Brown, Basilio Novelo, Dr. Gregorio Garcia, Dion Flowers Sr.