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"Two
steps forward, three steps back" as the saying goes. It is now the Belize
Supreme Court Chief Justice's turn to make a move in the monopoly game being
played out between the Government of Belize and Belize Telecommunications
Limited (BTL). According to a release issued last week from the Ministry of
Budget Management, Investment and Public Utilities, on Tuesday, February
12th, Chief Justice Abdulai
Conteh granted BTL leave to apply for a judicial review of a Stop Order issued
by Minister Ralph Fonseca of Public Utilities. In granting this leave, the Chief
Justice suspended the Stop Order until a full hearing of the case by judicial
review. It was stated the Chief Justice did not revoke the Stop Order; he has
merely suspended it, pending the hearing which is expected to take place in the
next few weeks. In a related release by BTL, the
telecommunications monopoly informed their customers of the following: "On
Tuesday, February 12 th, 2002,
the Court ruled that there are grounds to accept BTL's application for leave of
judicial review of Statutory Instrument No. 11 of 2002, which contained a Stop
Order. The Court also ruled that the effect of the Statutory Instrument be
suspended and any action by the Minister, in relation to the Statutory
Instrument, be stayed until the matter is fully determined by the
Court." The BTL release continued, "As a result of this
decision of the Court, BTL is no longer compelled by the Statutory Instrument
and will therefore keep to the new rates it had implemented on December 1, 2001.
As a consequence, all bills with effect from January 1, 2002, will be issued at
these rates as shown below," (shown were the rates previously implemented
December 1, 2001).
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