By Belize Live News Staff: A celebration of the Belize dollar turned sharp when the Deputy Prime Minister was asked about what that dollar actually buys.
The Central Bank marked 50 years of the peg to the US dollar at two to one on Tuesday evening, with Cordel Hyde giving the keynote.
He called the peg something Belizeans have taken for granted, and said surviving 50 years under it speaks to Belizean ingenuity, discipline and sacrifice in the face of external pressures that could have gone very badly.
Then a reporter put the NTUCB senator’s position to him, that on the streets the dollar has effectively devalued.
Hyde did not dodge it.
“I think that we’ve not done enough where cost of living challenges are concerned for the everyday man and woman, and we have to be seen to be doing that.”
Then he named who he wants held to account.
“One of the ways we have to be far more activist is as it relates to the wicked grocers and retailers who insist on gouging everyday people and who insist on taking advantage of our people.”
“We have to make examples of them. We have to lock them down or lock them up.”
Strong words. What follows them is the question.
