Competition Push Accelerates as UDP Flags Weak Oversight

Belize is accelerating efforts to establish its first competition framework, launching a two‑month consultation to draft a law that safeguards consumers and reins in dominant industries. But even as government advances that process, the opposition United Democratic Party is sounding alarms about what it calls a weak regulatory environment, arguing that gaps in oversight have made it difficult to extract basic data from BTL and properly scrutinize major deals.

 

Tracy Panton, Leader, United Democratic Party

“When the members of the UDP met with the chairman wo should resign and should have been resigned by now, Markhelm Lizzaraga, and his executive team, there was a ten slide PowerPoint presentation giving all the bells and whistles but no real data. So we have been pulling data, information out of BTL. Whenever the temperature gets too hot in the room there is a little more information that BTL provides. That is not how we conduct the affairs of the people. We need for an independent evaluation and if the regulatory framework is weak, as we have indicated, it indeed is, then we must strengthen the regulatory framework before any such deal or acquisition is allowed to proceed.”