AmbergrisCaye.com Home Forums Belize by District Stann Creek Teachers Rallied And Railed Up In Griga

This was their fifth rally: there have been 2 in the north, one in the central, and another in the west. Today in the south, as the public exchanges between the union and the government have degenerated to a string of recriminations, the tone from the union leadership was belligerent. Here's the story from the south:..

Daniel Ortiz reporting
The schools in the Stann Creek District were closed for the entire day, because a little less than half of the 712 teachers in that district participated in the 4th day of BNTU rallies this month.

As the most robust union Machinery, the teachers didn't take it very well that Education Minister Patrick Faber and Prime Minister Dean Barrow used the House Meeting last week to criticize them on the biggest public stage in the country.

Luke Palacio - National President, BNTU
"We are not using the protection of the House of Representatives to call people names. We do not use the protection and the privileges of the House of Representatives to make statements about teachers. We come to the public square like we are doing out here in Dangriga today."

"How many times we get to school and we are told 'you need to take over this class because these 3 teachers went to workshop.' How many times sometimes we go to school and we are told 'take your children to the civic center because some minister or somebody is coming to give a talk.' That is not productive. The students are losing time then. But now because the teachers are rallying the poor children are suffering. All of a sudden Patrick Faber found love for the children."

"Now he has indicated to us... again, like I told you he was nice on Monday. I wander if that was Patrick sitting down there. He said don't worry about Thursday; you all can rally, like he was giving us permission. We were going to rally anyway. He told us that we could rally Thursday and that payday on Friday - we must not worry about that because he said that we were not discussing that right now."

The national President had a few choice words the PM, saying that unlike the nation's leader, he, Palacio, was actually acting on the mandate of constituents who elected him as their leader.

Luke Palacio - National President, BNTU
"The public can see the suffering that teachers go through every single day and yet they want to try and vilify us in the public domain. The Prime Minister has called me a "wind up doll." The message to him is this: that I am unwinding and because I am unwinding he has to deal with me. He will continue to deal with me and the BNTU because this train is not going to stop. He also called me a prisoner of the teacher. Yes I am a prisoner of the teacher but I listen to my constituents and that is why I am in Dangriga today because I respond to my constituents; the teachers who voted me as the president says that I should be in Dangriga and I am in Dangriga and he could not have stop that."

"That is exactly what he should be doing; listening to the people who have voted them into office they would not have the teachers rallying today if they had listened."

On this particular rostrum, Palacio used very little of his time talking about their salary adjustment. Instead, he continued to strike at the different scandals, keeping them fresh in the public consciousness.

Luke Palacio - National President, BNTU
"We are not here talking any blue and red. The only blue we are talking here is blue note - give us our salary adjustment. The red we are talking about is give us the five dollars - that is the red we are talking about."

"We are talking about Social Security reform; Social Security that affects every single one of us. When you get your salary, they have taken out Social Security and then when you get sick you must prove to Social Security that you got sick because of your job - nonsense. It happens every single day and yet they can use Social Security money without consulting the people of this country and invested 50 million in BTL and they are looking for another six hundred thousand right now to invest in another company."

"Brothers and sisters, what the guest speaker said earlier I have to echo; we need to see some serious changes going on in this country. You note that they have made some advances when it comes to the corruption issue because last week in San Ignacio we were lashing them that we do not know that the word corruption has a new meaning - distasteful but, not corrupt."

The 6th and final Rally for this month takes place in Toledo tomorrow.

Channel 7