Minister of Transport Denies Politics in Revocation of Bus Service Permit

Minister of Transport, Rodwell Ferguson, has weighed in on the issue surrounding Serrano’s Bus Service and says that there was no politics involved in the revocation of the owner’s road service permit. In recent weeks, Hernan Serrano, the owner of Serrano’s Bus Service, reportedly claimed he was being run out of business due to political victimisation. Serrano alleges that his road service permit was not renewed due to political interference from the Ladyville Village Chairman, Bernardo Bennet, who is the owner of Central Transit. However, Bennett refutes that claim and says he played no role in the decision to cancel Serrano’s permit. Today, Minister Ferguson confirmed Bennett’s claim and explained that the decision to cancel Serrano’s permit was made by the Transport Board due to several infractions. 

Rodwell Ferguson, Minister of Transport: “When you are given a road service permit it comes with certain criteria that you must be able to reach based on the department’s perspective. If I am correctly saying that the transport board is independent of me while we appoint them they act on their own behalf and over the last one year I believe that every so often there is a report coming against Serrano and so the board came to the conclusion that it is time now for us to say Mr.Serrano we’ll part ways since your contract expires I believe sometime in April or March and fortunately the transport board has a member of the bus operators Mr. Shaw who also voted unanimously with the other members to say it is time for Serrano to go. While he has his investment you are providing a service for the community and so the board decided you know what we are not going to renew your contract and Mr.Shaw came back to me afterwards and said as the minister can you overturn their decision I said I will respect the decision of the transport board and I will see where we go from there.”

Love News understands that the bus company was served with a letter, citing two infractions from 2021 and 2023, as the reasons for the non-renewal.  The company has been doing runs from the Milpa Area in Ladyville to Belize City 2015, and had recently acquired two additional buses at a cost forty thousand dollars, reportedly in an effort to comply with the government’s bus upgrades.