Montero Fingered in Nepotism Scandal

Belize City, Thursday, March 11, 2010

Channel Five News broke the story this week that the principals or subscribers for Gosen Products, the Belizean partners in Eco-Green, a company that had been awarded an exclusive contract to harvest and export Xate, are Ramon Matus Jr. of Macal Street in San Ignacio and Robert Jaime Montero of Church Street, the son of the Minister of Agriculture and Cayo Central area representative Hon. Rene Montero.

Channel Five told its viewers that two men, Mario Mendez Cobar and Mildred Aguilar who are both registered at the same address in Guatemala, and Gosen Products are the owners of Eco-Green. Furthermore the news team  said that their investigation had unveiled that the company was only paying a nominal fee of one cent royalty to the Government of Belize when the going price is normally three or four cents per leaf. They noted that sources close to the minister had told them that Eco Green is employing Guatemalans and not Belizeans.

The newscast concluded that “… the Minister’s son is a director of Gosen, that is a subscriber of Eco-Green, and Eco-green is the beneficiary of a lucrative contract awarded by the Government.”

Our sources in Cayo insist that everyday Eco-Green’s Guatemalan workers are brought in and transported to work in a blue Ministry of Agriculture Toyota Tacoma complete with blue GOB licence plates.

In the same newscast Earl Codd of Santa Elena told Channel Five News: “We had a license going back in 2006-2007, the license was cancelled by the Forest Department for no apparent reason before the expiration and was issued to one Gosen product for operation up in the Chiquibul area. We are still questioning why the license was cancelled and the reason for it. We had complied with all the necessary requirements set out within the license, setting in the proper proposal, security plan and harvesting plan and to date we have not received any response as to why the license was cancelled.”

He went on to say that he believed the $250,000he had invested in the business was irrevocably lost.

This is not the first time that it’s been reported that Montero has been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Just a few months ago it was revealed that the Ministry of Natural Resources had “acquired” 20 acres of land owned by Montero in the Mountain Pine Ridge area, and he was to be paid almost $90,000 for it. In fact less than a week after the “acquisition” the Ministry of Finance ponied up a cheque for $20,000.

Late last year the story broke that Montero had acquired a caye that was supposed to be the property of the Social Security of Belize, and that it was being sold for US$1.5 million.

The San Pedro Sun reported on December 17, 2009: “… Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Cooperatives, Honorable Rene Jaime Montero has obtained and is allegedly selling an island located in a lagoon on Ambergris Caye.

“The land in question is an island measuring 3.69 acres located some 3.5 miles north of San Pedro Town on Ambergris Caye within Laguna de Frances. Minister’s Fiat Grant Number 823 of 2007 entered in The Crown Lands Books (Grant section) shows Minister Rene Montero as the holder of the island. The island is registered as Cayo Frances which, according to realtors in San Pedro, largely consists of mangroves and the area is used for sport fishing, mainly Tarpon. Montero obtained documentation to the island on September 28^th…the document allegedly surfaced when the Minister began transactions to sell the island in late November of 2009.

“While Minister Montero possesses ownership documents to Cayo Frances, another document leaked shows that the island was already owned prior to it being given to Montero. In 2005, the same island, known as Cayo Frances, was granted to the Social Security Board (SSB) by the Government of Belize. Minister’s Fiat Grant number 873 of 2005 shows that SSB was granted the 3.69 acre island.”

When the San Pedro Sun newspaper tried to contact Montero to get to the bottom of that particular matter, they were told the Minister was on a month’s vacation.

Montero’s tenure as an elected representative and minister has become increasingly dogged by scandals and missteps. Less than a month after being elected his home was shot up.

He was soon at loggerheads with the Public Service Union over his high-handed decision to fire several persons he considered to be PUP sympathizers from the Belize Agricultural Health Authority.

Last year his decision to award vegetable importation contracts to cronies and associates provoked protests and demonstrations by the Belize Vegetable Importers Association.

And if all that isn’t enough, now there is word that Montero is the majority owner of a company named Agro-tech Supplies which is the company through which all the materials must be purchased for house construction and repairs in his constituency under the Venezuelan housing project. We are told that not only does Agro-tech not possess any showroom, warehouse and inventory, but the orders are filled at another well known hardware supplier

Despite Montero’s name being called in different ‘questionable circumstances,’ the Prime Minister seems oblivious to the stink of corruption which seems to hang like black clouds over his Minister of Agriculture.

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