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Friday, January 12, 2007 The INdependent Reformer Page 1 The dependent IN Reform for the People Vol. 2 No. 2 Friday, January 12, 2007 $1.00 SellingSellingSelling out:out:out: howhow muchmuch isis youryour votevote worworth?th? A blue note? A plate of dinner and a about promises for they “know” how votes were otherwise lost. That people who now ride to the polls? Have you ever been future employment, purchased in past elections: sit in Cabinet, hold office as Area offered, or accepted money or favors pieces of land, The voter is given a marked Representatives, would not be where for your support on election day? If so, scholarships for your ballot, by the vote buyer, to be they are right now if the people who you are not alone. But what’s really in it children? Isn’t that deposited in the ballot box. voted for them had not accepted money. for you? What does it really cost you, vote buying too? Instead of marking the ballot Had not allowed themselves to be paid and your country? Or is it? Maybe you received at the polling place the off, had not sold their franchise for The buying and selling of votes, have to decide that voter deposits the previously practically nothing. together with the importation of one yourself. But marked ballot in the ballot box And it costs those politicians foreigners to vote in national elections consider the following and brings the unmarked ballot practically nothing in the wider scheme is a familiar component of the election to the buyer. The of things. After the last national election campaign in Belize. It is so blatant, so unmarked ballot the buzz in one villages was that there obvious in so many instances the is then had been more than $100,000 in checks Political Reform Commission exchanged for cashed immediately before the voting, addressed the problem. In their report the money which to obtain cash to buy votes. That’s the commissioners noted, “It is a well he or she was to about the same amount in salary some – known fact that the practice, while be paid for his top government appointees get in a year. illegal is rampant”. or her vote. Or some government drivers get in That was in 2000. Has anything It is entirely perks and allowances. And where did changed since then, or will Belize’s next possible that that money come from? Some wealthy election be for sale too? Will your vote such a system campaign financier? Or the taxes go on the auction block, given to the allowed certain collected in that same village? highest bidder? candidates to Let’s not mince words here. The Neva! You say, you would never sell win elections that voter that sells his or her vote makes a your vote. Not for cash maybe, but what scenario reported by people who claim they may have (Please Turn To Page 3) MoneyMoney LaunderingLaundering inin Belize?Belize? Inside this Issue By Justin Other Gingo, Esq. money that (s)he will have to account for Predictions for once it enters the formal economy. This article contains no accusations. I will ask you where it came from. And What to do??? The drug manufacturer Belize in 2007 will simply describe money laundering as decline to accept the deposit if they don’t or dealer really doesn’t want to be in the it exists world-wide, and then perhaps like your looks or the sound of your laundry business – he just wants to spend pg. 4 suggest some places where you might find explanation! (That’s why a Belizean bank his profits without harassment from it yourself in Belize. My primary source is wants so much information about you international law enforcement, which could Jeffery Robinson’s book, The when you open a new account.) include jail time. Because his profits are Bare Facts Laundrymen, (Simon & Schuster, 1994) Profit. Consider how a normal so extreme, he can normally sell his dirty which does not mention Belize at all. business makes money. They buy or build money for a lot less than its face value in pg. 5 However, as you read the book, if you a product which costs them $100. If they the US. For instance, he can sell a dollar are a Belizean or “an old Belize hand” as sell it for $200, that’s “a hundred-percent for fifty cents – it only cost him 10 cents! I am, you will notice many places where markup.” Such a profit is considered very So, he sells it to a laundryman, or perhaps Where do the laundering may be going on. good in normal (honest) business. goes to a laundromat and does it himself! Money Laundering Basics Drug Mark-ups. A South American In Belize, dirty money (in US dollars) is independents What is Money Laundering? Quite manufacturer invests $1000 in raw sold for a premium on the black market. stand? simply, it is the handling of money which materials and produces a product which Sweetness on top of sweetness. A Belize’s was collected illegally. Most often, that he sells to a North American wholesaler finance ministry official called this the pg. 7 money is drug money, but it may also be for $10,000. A thousand-percent “parallel market” when reporters were money collected from the sale of markup. He is very happy, but he now probing a missing six million from a public pornography, illegal contracts, from has a lot of dirty money he has to make company. Blessed & human trafficking or political corruption. legitimate. The Laundrymen. In Robinson’s Ever since Al Capone was sent off to The North American wholesaler takes book, he relates hundreds of actual cases Peaceful: 2007 prison for income tax evasion, potentially the product and cuts it to one-fourth to of money laundering throughout the world. Pg. 9 dirty money has been under close scrutiny. one-eighth its original strength, and sells The process is always pretty much the If you try to deposit any large ($10,000?) the new, greater amount for $100,000. same. Gather the money, Wash it, and sum of money in a bank in Belize, they He is very happy, but now he has a lot of (Please Turn To Page 3) Friday, January 12, 2007 The INdependent Reformer Page 2 Editorial Director LetterLetter toto thethe EditorEditor Meb Cutlack Just Change the names... But remember that, for example, half of and we need to exploit these. the sites purporting to discuss Enuf for now. Dear Editor, the 9/11 issue are actually run indirectly Signed: Senior Rick I refer to the article Vested Interests by the US Government. So, you can Control Honduras in the Jan 5 issue of probably believe about half of what you Suffering in the Land Editor the INdependent; in some ways, we could read on the internet! Dear Editor, just change the names, and it would be As a Belize note: The report: Task I laughed so hard reading the article Karla Heusner Vernon descriptive of Belize, eh? Force on Services — Strategy for titled “Thirty Minute Country” in the latest And, it is descriptive of the US as well. the Development of the Services Sector edition of the Independent Weekly. While Again, just change the names.... — 15 Oct 1999 is no longer on Belize the author injected a lot of humor into the This report is scandalous, of course, government website. This report was article, it is all so very true. and I don’t think we’d see a produced by a blue ribbon panel As a born and raised Belizean, it hurts report of this detail in Belize, and certainly commissioned by the Hon. Said Musa; me to say that I would not want to live General Manager not in the US. The major its major conclusion was that there now. After about three days in Belize, corporations in the US have a death grip the telecom monopoly was the largest I’m climbing the walls wanting to get the Trevor Vernon on the media, and they are single factor holding back growth hell out. Call me traitor, call me chicken, engaged in massive propaganda in Belize. I believe that it was omitted from but I just don’t have the stomach for Belize operations to shift attention away from the new gov website because it’s too anymore. themselves and toward ‘enemies’ who embarrassing. The resale of BTL to “our Every time I visit, the one song that cannot defend themselves (like the British cousin” has ensured that a defacto keeps ringing in my ear is that old Jimmy Advertising Muslims) or those who don’t vote (like monopoly of telecom services will Cliff song from the late 60’s titled the illegal aliens). continue to exist. “Suffering In The Land”. Do you know In Belize, the UDP focuses on the poor If you have not read this report, youcan that this song was actually banned from Sling Shot Advertising — accusing the PUP of neglecting find it on the ‘waybackmachine’ at: playing on Radio Belize back in the late them, and not spending public monies http://web.archive. org/web/ 60’s? And it was not because of any and Signs properly. Meanwhile, the UDP 20000819025203/www. belize.gov. bz vulgarity or anything like that. It was neglects the critical issues of governance, library/ task_force/ welcome.shtml because of the words “the rich get richer transparency and accountability. And, we It points out that (in 1999) 68% of and the poor get poorer”.