Minister of Home Affairs Defends 13th Amendment

Minister of Home Affairs Kareem Musa and Attorney General Anthony Sylvestre appeared on Open Your Eyes this morning, diving deep into the proposed constitutional change that’s stirring controversy across the country. Minister Musa says the Thirteenth Amendment isn’t introducing anything new, it’s simply giving constitutional backing to a law that’s been on the books since 1993. He argues that while critics fear government overreach, the amendment actually adds more oversight than current emergency powers. Still, not everyone’s convinced. With public resistance growing, will this move strengthen public safety or weaken civil liberties?

 

Kareem Musa, Minister of Home Affairs

“So since 2018 to present both successive governments have been utilizing the state of emergency as a lifesaving tool because essentially that is what it has become, when crime and violence among feuding gangs becomes so intense that there is constant retaliation among these groups and that often times leads to the lose of innocent lives in Belize, not just gang members, because there is this school of thought that says, just let gang members kill themselves out. There is collateral damage. In this year alone think of Mr. Avilar who died right here on Coney Drive. Think of the young man Orosco who was taking his child to school. Think of Ms. Jones and her handicap son. Those are four lives lost in just this year as you describe, collateral damage. So, the question is, what do you do when you have this escalation in violence that leads to the loss of gang member lives, but also the lose of innocent citizens lives. That is why we say we need to have legislation that can counter this because in the streets there is a code, if I kill Isani, his family will not say its me, even if they witness it. They will take out the retaliation themselves. There is a street and a gang code that we have to recognize.”