Since their street protest back in November, the University of Belize students' opposition to the proposed IT-VET project on the Technical College Campus has been considerably silenced. All indications are that construction of the $40 million "IT-VET" will begin shortly on the campus which now hosts their Engineering Department.
No one from the school's administration would talk to us and most student government leaders are still on Christmas break. One man who still has a lot to say is former Minister of Education Cordel Hyde. And Hyde should know because the original IT-VET was supposed to be built in his division, Lake Independence, but it wasn't. The land was later used by Hyde for a housing project. In December Hyde told Keith Swift that if was his decision to make the IT_VET would be built on the southside and UB would be able to keep the technical campus.
Hon. Cordel Hyde, Former Minister of Education
"I think that what happened with the decisions and the development as it relates to the Technical Campus have been quite unfortunate."
Keith Swift,
Are you in favor of IT-VET being built on the Technical college campus?
Hon. Cordel Hyde,
"I am in favor of ITVET for Belize. It is a huge project as I said. Where it should it be built, I think that's better left to the technicians and the people who are in charge of that project. If that is the only place it can be built then I have no problem with it."
Keith Swift,
Sir but as you mention if that's the only place it could be built, wasn't there land reserved in your constituency for IT-VET and that land was then used by yourself for some other project?
Hon. Cordel Hyde,
"Yeah. There was an area designated on the southside of Belize City, Lake Independence for a portion of that project. When I was out of government for that ten or eleven months in 2005, a decision was made to move away from that location and rather to expand and upgrade the north side's Center for Employment Training. So when I got back in government, the land was there and we decided that we better make use of the land for benefit of as many Belizeans as possible. And you know the difficulty in getting land in Belize City, especially land that is filled already, and so ended up deciding, agreeing as a government, to build houses on the land."
Keith Swift,
If it was your choice to make, would IT-VET be built on the Technical Campus?
Hon. Cordel Hyde,
"If it were my choice, it wouldn't be on the Technical Campus, it would be on the south side location that we had agreed to years ago. It would be located rightfully in Lake Independence because that was the area designated some time ago."
The proposed plan is for the university to surrender the title to government which will be used to secure the loan from the Caribbean Development Bank.
