Briceño’s Audit Request Under Fire for Skipping Parliament

Prime Minister John Briceño says he has reached out to the Financial Secretary to trigger an Auditor General investigation into the Mira-related revelations. But Public Service Union President Dean Flowers argues that move sidesteps the proper channel, insisting the request should have gone through the Clerk of the National Assembly. Flowers warns that how the audit is initiated could determine how much the public ever gets to see. In his view, if the findings never make it to the floor of the National Assembly, Belizeans could be left in the dark about what the investigation truly uncovers.

 

Dean Flowers, President, Public Service Union

“The Prime Minister ought to have been in touch with the clerk of the National Assembly, because the auditor general does not answer to the prime minister or the financial secretary. The Auditor General answers to the National Assembly and the clerk should have said to her, go in and do what we need to do and bring it to the National Assembly so that we can lay it on the table. What the Belizean people will see unfolding, is that the Auditor General Report will not be presented to the National Assembly. They will go and say according got the law, to the Prime Minister will decide whether to make it public and that will be the end of that. And for the Prime Minister to have the audacity to say that the audit will take three months, he is not an auditor. He does not know the scope of the audit. And from the revelation, the auditor should be looking at a hundred percent of the sample population. So, how the hell you will just say, it is saying to me the prime minister is saying that after three months this will blow over like a little breeze Mira and you can comeback and continue with whatever you and your family may have been engaged in.”

 

Flowers asserts that the Smart Stream leaks are just the tip of the iceberg and goes even further to demand to an audit be conducted across multiple government ministries.

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

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