BELIZE-Opposition Leader moves to prevent legislators from representing a party in Parliament.

BELMOPAN, Belize, CMC – The internal wrangling within the main opposition, the United Democratic Party (UDP), takes a dramatic twist on Friday when Opposition Leader Moses “Shyne” Barrow moves to inform the Speaker that two members of the opposition are no longer members of the party.

Barrow has written to the Speaker, Valerie Woods, ahead of Friday’s Parliament sitting, indicating that Patrick Faber and Tracy Panton are no longer members of the UDP and requesting that she “declare at the next Sitting of the House of Representatives that Members from Albert and Collet have ceased to be members of the House of Representatives because of having been a member of a political party.”

Barrow’s letter also informs the Speaker of the House that Faber and Panton are no longer representatives of the UDP in Parliament.

But Faber, in a Facebook page post, said that Barrow’s letter to the Speaker is riddled with baseless claims that he has resigned from the UDP.

In his post, Faber, who was appointed the party leader in July 2020 after then-prime minister Dean Barrow publicly indicated his desire to retire at the end of his term, said that this is not the first time the Opposition Leader has wrongly invoked the Constitution for political gain. He added, “Barrow’s actions display either a profound misunderstanding of the Constitution or a malicious intent to undermine my position.”

Earlier this month, the Alliance for Democracy, led by four members of the UDP who were deemed to have resigned, categorically denied that they had resigned as members of the opposition party.

Those four politicians, including Panton and Faber, have since presented a white paper proposing how they intend to implement reform within the party.

Panton, who the Alliance supports as the party leader of choice, told reporters then, “We want to be very clear to all those who are listening: the members who were constructively resigned by 15 members of the Central Executive Committee would like to say categorically that we have not resigned from the United Democratic Party.

“We have not resigned. We will not resign and will be running for our respective constituencies in the next general election. We also want to reject the narrative that members of this Alliance representing sixteen constituencies are on a mission to destroy the party and that we are on a mission to destroy the current party leader of the United Democratic Party. This Alliance seeks to preserve the democracy of the United Democratic Party And, by extension, the democracy of Belize,” she said.

UDP zone coordinator Delroy Cutkelvin said all attempts had been made to resolve the issue between Barrow and the Alliance members, but that proved fruitless.

“When the central executive first met to consider this matter of this so-called breakaway group, some came to that meeting with their minds made up that they were going to move swiftly to deal with this matter.

“There were others like myself, Diane, people like Lindsay Garbutt, people like Alberto August who said let us give an opportunity for a mediation process and there were some who said what if the mediation process yields no positive results? And I was quick to say, we have to be optimistic that it will yield positive results because we all love this party,” Cutkelvin added.

He said he wanted to make the point that the party leader, the chairman, and others have exercised great restraint in making certain decisive moves to address what is happening here.

“So I am making the broader point that there is much democracy at work in the party’s operations because it was because of our insistence that we must give another opportunity to try to make this thing work.

“It’s because of that that we ended up with a mediation process in the first place, and no one can rule out the possibility that some mediation can still happen. I maintain that the UDP has been through these tribulations and trials before, and we have eventually worked it out,” he added.

Cutkelvin noted that Friday’s parliamentary meeting will be the first since the John Briceño administration purchased the controversial piece of land in Belmopan a few weeks ago for the construction of the University Hospital.

But political observers say the question that will be foremost on the minds of legislators when they meet at the George Price Center for Peace and Development Center while the Assembly Building is being refurbished is whether or not the elected members of the opposition will turn out to support Barrow on any of these issues, given the internal wrangling.

“As an opposition, one of the main roles of the opposition is to keep the government in check and line, not just to win a general election. And this case in point that I raised underscores that. Here is an outrageous deal that the entire nation is revolted by, and you can’t let us off the hook, and we can’t let ourselves off the hook. We are the constitutional opposition,” Cutkelvin insisted.

He said he has no reason to believe that the representatives will not be there “other than one member who we know has had issues attending House meetings for her reasons, which I won’t try to defend.

“But I have no reason to believe that the Honorable Hugo Patt will not be there. I have no reason to believe that the Honorable Patrick Faber and the Honorable Tracy Panton will not be there,” he added.