Prime Minister Briceno Addresses Missing Funds from Solid Waste Management Authority

Prime Minister John Briceno was in his division today attending the opening ceremony for an Animation Bootcamp for Women.  We will tell you more of that boot camp later on.  For now, we can tell you that after delivering the keynote address this morning, Briceno spoke with the media on several issues of concerns.  Among them is the report of missing money from the Solid Waste Management Authority that the government had confirmed via a press release this week.

John Briceño, Prime Minister of Belize: “The Minister informed us in cabinet of supposedly there seems to be some unaccounted funds, monies that quite likely have been mismanaged and I need to be very careful how I use the terms. There have been many instances when we give interviews and the words that we use are used in court to get to be able to get some of these people off. So I don’t want to say more. I want basically to tell you that we’re doing a thorough investigation and that any information that’s found out and any wrongdoing that we find we’re going to have the police involved, I think the police is already involved and if there’s any wrongdoing we’re going to ensure that these people see their day in court and to be able to account to the Belizean people. The point is that we want people to know that something is happening but that we’re investigating it. We’re not trying to hide it but we need to have that investigation and let the chips fall where they may and whosoever is responsible if something went wrong those persons have to be held accountable.”

Reporter: I know you can’t give details but can you say if the Director of the management authority is on administrative leave during the investigation ? 

John Briceño, Prime Minister of Belize: “I’m not sure if she’s on administrative leave at this point but I did know that she was asked to take a few days off but probably if it is merited probably it’s already done, I’ve not been informed, but certainly if they need to put her on administrative leave if it’s not been done yet it will be done.”

Love News was informed that the missing money is in the vicinity of one million dollars.  Our newsroom has also confirmed that a police report was given at the CIB Belmopan office./