They've threatened to strike next Monday, forcing the Ministry of Transport to meet with the Belize Bus Association today.
Tonight, after those talks, the BBA will meet with their membership of 16 bus operators to decide if they will proceed with or press pause on the strike.
In a meeting today at the Biltmore, the BBA took 6 points to the minister, with the main one being pricing.
They currently receive 14 cents per mile while the NBC is getting 19 cents per mile. They are requesting an immediate price adjustment to help alleviate their financial strain.
At the end of it, the Ministry requested that they hold off on any action until after next Tuesday's Cabinet meeting. We spoke to President of the BBA Philip Jones:
Phillip Jones, President - BBA
"The main one was the assistance with the fuel and he had mentioned to us that cabinet did agree to meet and discuss to see how they can assist us and they had asked for us to give the until Tuesday when Cabinet meets if we can allow them to put the strike on pause until Cabinet meets Tuesday. So I will have to meet with the members, I have mentioned that to the Minister and I will have to get back to him and the secretary, we will have our meeting and then discuss with the member and see what they decide in moving forward."
Reporter:
"Are you pleased with the way that the meeting went?"
Phillip Jones, President - BBA
"Ah, it went fairly, I was hoping along with the members that um we have gotten something concrete today but we understand how the government works and the minister humbly asked that Cabinet asks that we can put whatever plans was on hold Monday until Tuesday when Cabinet meet and then they will see how they can assist the bus operators."
"They are business people and their last option is to strike but if there is no other alternative then they have no other choice but at this time, as long as the minister keeps his promise, I'm sure the operators would be considerate in that."
The Ministry of Education has stepped in for bus owners who are contracted to do school runs and the BBA is saying they hope that their minister can do the same:
Phillip Jones, President - BBA
"Our position is the highway and this is our immediate concern, so the minister for assisting the school operators but now we are relying on our minister to assist us on the highway runs."
"We have explained the issue we are facing with the high costs and the members here and the executive represented the members well everyone participated and shared their concern and the minister understand, the CEO was there, the chairlady and they recognize the struggle you're going through and we show them in details the concern we are facing with the high cost of fuel because we stress on fuel but bare in mind that fuel trickle down to other things and it's not only fuel, it's part it's maintenance, it's up keeping, it's servicing, everything goes up when fuel goes up and I must say that they understand the position that we're in and it's a grave on an the concern is urgent and the position that the operations are in is a serious one"
The BBA is expected to meet tonight to make a final decision.
