One union we didn't mention which also made a modest representation was the Belize Medical and Dental Union. And while the joined with the NTUCB on the BTL firing issue, the doctors have other worries that they took to the hill.
Dr. Martha Habet,
"We have a lot of issues, not only the budget. We are here because we are supporting this activity but our problem, specifically for the BMDU is the use of public money to buy private institutions like Universal Health Services. So that is still a fight for us, it is still an unsolved problem because we have not been getting any answers so we are still fighting for it.
They don't have their act together, they don't know yet how the UHS is going to be run because they haven't paid the debt. But our concern is that the more time we take to pay the debt then the interest are running and then we will end up paying much more money. So there are two things: either they pay the debt, if they have to pay it because we still don't know if there is a guarantee, that is still pending. They haven't showed guarantee yet and once that is not shown then we have our reservations. We know if the country should still go ahead and pay the debt.
We want people to understand what we are fighting for because we need everybody's support. We don't think that just, they think that we don't want to work or we want only things for our gain, we need for the people to know that we are fighting not for us, but for the rights, the rights of a better health service.
We know that now the Ministry of Health is trying to do renovations at the different hospitals. Those renovations are due from many many years so it is not that they are just thinking about it, it's been many years but they gave the moneys for the private institutions and so they can not fulfill the obligations."
Again, we'll have more from the hill later on in the news - as we show you what happened when the gathering went from a legal protest to an illegal gathering.
