New Police Leadership Signals Tighter Discipline and Reform Ahead

Changes are coming and police officers are being cautioned to take heed and prepare to make the necessary adjustments.  With the recent changes in the senior command of the Belize Police Department, ranging from the Police Commissioner to the Minister, a more disciplined and structured system is on the way.  In a recent interview with Minister Oscar Mira, he spoke of a reform of the department.  Yesterday, CEO Elton Bennett echoed those sentiments, indicating that the plan is to raise the bar and the morale within the department.  He says by extension, the efficiency of the officers will be improved.  

Elton Bennett, CEO, Ministry of Home Affairs: “I don’t see a rebellion and I don’t see a hesitation from members of the police department as we work together to improve the professional standards of the department and professionalized department. I believe that every police officer who joins the service joins to serve in a department that Belize is proud of. You want to be a proud cop. You want for people to look at your department and the image that you carry, the responsibility that you carry as a cop, you want to be respected. So I do believe that the members of the department will not be hesitant to these changes. These changes are inevitable and these changes are designed to improve the standards and the image of the department. So I do see members of the police department as very supportive to these changes because we all want to work in a credible organization that is very well respect it. So I do believe that we will move together quite easily to be honest.”

With changes often bringing some degree of pushback, Love News asked CEO Bennett if he anticipates rebellion in the process.

Elton Bennett, CEO, Ministry of Home Affairs: “The ministry will be very hard when it comes to discipline. There is a process in place where the Commissioner of Police has been delegated authority from the Security Services Commission and we will do what we can do to strengthen those delegations of authority and those disciplinary measures that will be very necessary to improve the professional standards of the department. So from my approach I have been given the green light from the minister to implement and to adopt very stiff discipline measures to ensure that, again, we can all have a police department that we are proud of. That starts with discipline. So, yes, we will be having a very hard approach in that regard. This is one of the things that Minister Oscar Mira discussed with me just a while ago. These programs that will be designed to inspire these police officers that may be experiencing hardship for whatever reason in the  nature of the job or otherwise, that we will be implementing programs with an attempt to inspire. However, that does not mean that we will be soft on discipline. As a matter of fact, I do intend to support a very stiff approach towards discipline. We cannot have any degree of tolerance towards ill-disciplined behavior and ill-disciplined conduct in our department and in our ministry. Therefore the members of the police department in this case are expected to conduct themselves in a high level of discipline.”