Belize needs $5M to stage referendum on decriminalisation of marijuana

Belize needs $5M to stage referendum on decriminalisation of marijuana

Prime Minister John Briceño says an estimated five million dollars (One Belize dollar=US$0.49 cents) will be required to stage a national referendum on the legislation of marijuana later this year.

While he described the funds needed as a “pittance” in comparison to the country’s move to defend its territorial borders with Guatemala, Prime Minister Briceño told reporters “we are trying to hold down the cost.

“The cost of a referendum is not only what it will cost for the Elections and Boundaries Commission – what they will spend, but also, there has to be an information campaign so that people could truly understand what is going to happen, what is the question and inform people properly so that when they go to the polls, they can make a decision based on what they believe how they should answer the question,” Briceno said.

Earlier this week, the Belize Coalition of Churches (BCC) said it will soon be putting forward its campaign after meeting the threshold for triggering a referendum on the issue of cannabis legalisation that could take place in September this year.

Under the Referendum Act, a referendum may be triggered when a petition receives the signatures of 10 per cent of the voting population.

Chief Elections Officer Josephine Tamai said the threshold to trigger the referendum had been met

“I can tell you that in terms of the number of petitions that we received, the total was 20,112 petitions. Of those petitions, a total of 18,891 or 19.7 per cent of the total number of registered electors, were accepted. So 18,891 signatures were accepted,” said Tamai.

She said as a result, she has written to Governor General Froyla Tzalam informing the head of state that the threshold has been met successfully.

Pastor Louis Wade, the church’s spokesperson for its anti-marijuana effort, said ‘we will be putting our campaign forward as soon as the Governor General makes the writ and releases it, and we are confident that Belizeans know the damage that marijuana has done in their community and in their household.

The House of Representatives on Friday debated the introduction of a supplementary allocation to cover the cost of the upcoming cannabis referendum.

Prime Minister John Briceño said his administration has to find the five million dollars that it didn’t budget for in its recent national budget.

He said that the government, particularly, the Minister of New Growth Industries Kareem Musa, did extensive consultations with the public on the marijuana issue.

“We spoke about it even when it was being decriminalised. I said why don’t we proceed and go all the way? What have we done with the decriminalising? What we have done is we have empowered the criminals because the criminals or the gangs, they are the ones that control the marijuana and sell it us the Belizean people.

“So now when you have it in your possession, once it’s under 10 grams, it’s legal. They can’t do you anything, but where did you get it? You had to buy it from somebody, so we felt that if we can legalise it and regularise it, that we can then control and remove it from the criminal elements and secondly, that we can earn some much-needed revenues for the government of Belize.”

Asked by reporters whether the referendum necessary at this time, Prime Minister Briceño replied saying “honestly I was one of them that saying maybe we should have the referendum and get it over with earlier, but when they told me it was going to cost as much as five million dollars, we said it’s really too much.

“And that five million dollars we could use to help people to get food on the table or help kids to go to school. There are so many other things that we can do. Maybe we can talk to the churches if they were prepared to say to hold it back and that when the time comes, that we’ve worked out all of these issues and we’re ready to put the law into effect to hold the referendum before we do that.

“I’m prepared to speak with them and ask them if they’re prepared to do that but we can’t hold it back anymore. It is out of our hands.”

Prime Minister Briceño said there is also concerned within the banking industry regarding the marijuana issue adding “we did present a paper to Cabinet to say that the banking is still a bit concerned and asking us not to proceed until those banking issues have been addressed.

“We have already agreed that this law will not be enacted until we have found a way of how we’re going to address the corresponding banking concerns that the banks have. So, that was not going to go into place immediately, but what is ironic is that the (opposition) UDP United Democratic Party), when they decriminalised marijuana, what they also did was legalise the cultivation of hemp, and as you know hemp is a controlled substance in the United States.

“So we already have that problem that if these growers of hemp would grow in such large scale that now they would be able to export, it also could potentially cause problems. So we need to do everything possible, and I want to assure the Belizean people, that even if we get the “yes” vote, we are not going to implement this legislation until we have managed to address a way where this industry will not affect the corresponding banking relationships that we have,” Prime Minister Briceño told reporters.