No Election Date Announcement This Friday as Legal Battle Over Redistricting Continues

Despite popular speculation, the 2025 General Elections will not be called on Friday. Today, the government confirmed that the Prime Minister will not be announcing a date for the elections at the next Sitting of the House of Representatives. The announcement stems from a legal challenge against the government by a group of Belizean voters. The group is accusing GOB of failing to implement crucial redistricting measures ahead of the upcoming general election. The claimants, Jeremy Enriquez, Rudolph Norales, and Jessica Tulcey, represented by their legal counsel, are seeking constitutional redress, arguing that the government’s inaction breaches their democratic rights under Section 90 of the Belize Constitution. The controversy stems from a 2019 consent order, in which the government and the Elections and Boundaries Commission (EBC) agreed to redefine electoral district boundaries to ensure fair and equal representation. The EBC submitted its proposals in July 2023, which were incorporated into the Representation of the People (Amendment) Bill of 2024. The bill was tabled in the National Assembly in May 2024 but has yet to be debated or passed, despite the government’s majority in Parliament. Love news spoke with Claimant Jeremy Enriquez who expressed that with political campaign activity intensifying and rumors of an imminent election announcement circulating, the holding elections under the current electoral boundaries would be both illegal and unconstitutional.

Jeremy Enriquez, Claimant: “For a number of years I’ve been writing and advocating for the Government of Belize to have, to abide by the constitution, to have a fair apportionment of electoral divisions. I’ve written several articles in the Amandala. I have voiced the opinion publicly and to no success. And the government from the past administration to this administration, has continued to flout  and not abide by the constitution and so I decided that it’s time to challenge and to take the matter to court. In the past, this was taken to court by the Belize Peace Movement also and this was in 2020 and the People’s United Party, who was campaigning, joined the case against the Belize Peace Movement to stop an injunction at the court which would force the government to redistrict, re-division the electoral division. So the People’s United Party government, when the injunction was blocked, they had also promised that they would re-division the electoral divisions in order to have fairness across the board. And for the past four years, that was not done. They found every excuse not to do it, and so we decided to take it to court. I was in Belize City ready to file an injunction to block the calling of elections at the House meeting this Friday. We sent notice yesterday to the authorities that that is what we were going to do and fortunately there is a response that at this House meeting on Friday, the government will not, the prime minister will not call for an election at that meeting. So that’s a big sigh of relief. But it hasn’t gotten the government off the hook from the commitment to abide by the constitution.”

The legal team gave the government until today, February 5, to confirm whether it intends to call elections without first passing the Representation of the People (Amendment) Bill, 2024. One of the major concerns of Belizeans was as to why the attorney representing the claimants was not a Belizean but Enriquez made us know that this is due to no attorneys in Belize being willing to take on the case. 

Jeremy Enriquez, Claimant: “It was difficult to find any Belize attorney. So that was the experience of the Belize Peace Movement. They were trying to find an attorney to be able to take this forward. But it was difficult to find. So we were looking for any external assistance that we could get to advance this forward where there was a police attorney from the US who was also engaged. And then there is this one from Trinidad who is also engaged. So it’s just that we couldn’t find the commitment, the enthusiasm of Belize from members of the bar to want to take this on. So that is the problem that we had.”

In response to the legal threat, the Attorney General’s office, represented by Eamon Courtenay, has denied any plans to announce an election date at the next sitting of Parliament on February 7, 2025. In a letter to Ramlogan, Courtenay stated, “We are instructed to confirm that the Prime Minister will not be announcing the date for the next general election at its next sitting on 7th February 2025, nor will he advise the Governor General to dissolve Parliament on the said date.” We will have more on this story in a subsequent newscast.