UDP CABINET TO BLAME FOR THE RAPE AND LOOTING OF EXOTIC WOODS FROM TOLEDO DISTRICT, PARTICULARLY THE GOLD RUSH FOR ROSEWOOD
The Gold Rush is on, for ROSEWOOD out of the TOLEDO DISTRICT. CHINA wants it and the CABINET MINISTERS SMELL money! Either through baksheesh, or party favorites and relatives with the EXPORT PERMITS for the ROSEWOOD. The media are supposed to be investigating the MONEY TRAIL today in Belmopan.
An aggressive media TV interview with the Forestry Officer chief on local cable tv the other day, let us put the facts together, also from the talk show with GASPAR VEGA, the Minister of Natural Resources the other day; we can draw different conclusions. Using common sense and trying to read between the lines, it is NOW EVIDENT that the BUCK stops with a CORRUPT UDP CABINET. The media today Monday are supposed to be in the Forestry Officer´s office in Belmopan to get the LIST OF ROSEWOOD EXPORTERS.
What we got from the Chief Forestry Officer, in between the lines so to speak; as he was afraid of saying anything that might LOSE HIM HIS JOB. The media were aggressive with him, but he didn´t say anything out of line, or endanger his job. What we got though, is that the FORESTRY DEPARTMENT are helpless!
The reason they are helpless, is that the setup in TOLEDO is that piratical looters and plundering harvesters are poaching, on private lands and national park lands. There was a lot of covering up with side issues and disinformation and false trails, but the media did a good job. The essence of which, is that; 33 MAYAN VILLAGES have the rights to cut wood as part of their, MAYAN LAND RIGHTS to communal lands around them. They do not have the right to export though, a raw exotic hardwood, which was prohibited under the PUP. This gives them the RIGHT to set their own rules, regulations and laws, about ROSEWOOD cutting, and value added product making, which finished products can be exported. The LUMBER PIRATES are using this free passage, of the UDP change of the regulations so to speak, to truck the ROSEWOOD logs NORTH, to be shipped out of the country in containers for pennies of their true worth as a VALUE ADDED PRODUCT. They are shipping ROSEWOOD as a raw commodity and when it is done, it will be gone for at least 200 years. Same with mahogany and cedar. Value Added Products like guitar decorative strips and furniture pieces, etc. When the trucks are stopped for checking, they are told by the drivers, or by people in the MAYA areas, that the cut logs you see piled up in the hundreds, in 8 feet, 6 x 6 inches raw commodity pieces, are FROM MAYAN LANDS and their rules apply. Now, exporting raw lumber pieces is allowed by UDP permits. The FORESTRY department have insufficient manpower to police the forests. Nor can they tell the difference between a ROSEWOOD log harvested from a National Park, or Private property, or from one cut from Mayan forests, for which the Mayan Alliance are supposedly the caretakers. Thus the FORESTRY DEPARTMENT ARE HELPLESS.
I believe it was a PUP POLICY that ROSEWOOD, MAHOGANY, CEDAR, LIGNUM VITEA AND SOME OTHERS HAD BEEN RULED BY THE PAST PUP GOVERNMENT, were forbidden to be shipped abroad as a raw commodity product, due to their small availability, or rarity. When the RULES were changed by this UDP CABINET is not known, but certainly the Cabinet Minister Gaspar Vega, who also claimed in his TV interview, that he was under pressure from his fellow mafia gang in the UDP CABINET, to issue EXPORT permits for ROSEWOOD as a RAW COMMODITY and not as a VALUE ADDED PRODUCT, laid the groundwork for this current plundering of a scarce, rare, exotic resource for GREED alone. The rules were changed by the UDP. This makes them GUILTY, the UDP GOVERNMENT CABINET of not having the long term best interests of Belize at heart.
Be interesting to find out from the media investigations where the money trail leads, through the layers of corruption protection expected here, in Belmopan. Wish the media luck! Will watch the news with interest for updates.
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COMMENT FROM MICHAEL REID, PUP PARTISAN WRITER.
This one is easy Ray,Ray! The trail leads to a company called GIV. German I. Vega, brother of the minister in charge of natural resources.
Every piece of wood exported requires a stamp and approval of the Forestry Dept. Of course, minister's discretion can and has given exemption to "the brother" to export at will.
This one is a no-brainer. If Rosewood is so sought after in furniture, why don't we create the industry and give our local artisans opportunity. Why export the raw product when you can ad value and export the end product for much more and allowing many more Belizeans to benefit?
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POLITICAL CORRUPTION AND GREED TAKE THE DAY, WITH THE PATRIMONY OF BELIZE
Do a google search for exotic woods, turning blanks, that are used for making small bowls, pens etc. You would be ammazed at the prices that these small peices of wood are bring. If the wood is being exported anyway, it should be marketed directly out of Bze at the higher value.
http://www.woodenpost.com/products/exotic_wood_turning_blanks.htm
Look at the price for that little piece of Black Mangrove, how much of that is being cut for development and discarded and left to rot.
Bze Kobuh,
The monkeys are running the zoo
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