And while hundreds of Chinese businesses are expected to be closed tomorrow, tonight there is also the threat that the national phone system could be in danger of being interrupted, just like the three hour shutdown of March 15th, when BTL workers demanded inclusion in discussions about the phone company's future. Well they are making that demand again, even as the BTL picture continues to become more and more muddled every day.
But this time the flashpoint is the sudden re-appearance of former Ashcroft Chairman and CEO Dean Boyce. He's taken up an office in the building which has sent out an alarm amongst the rank and file of workers telling them that 25% owner Michael Ashcroft is back, if not in the driver's seat then right next to it. In an exclusive interview with 7NEWS, Human Resources Manager Dale Trujeque and Communication Union President Paul Perriot discussed what they describe as a disturbing development and what they intend to do about it.
Dale Trujeque, Human Resources Manager BTL
"Apparently Mr. Boyce is there with an office, we understand from couple weeks, asking for the financials for the period Mr. Prosser was there. We have a fundamental problem with that. We don't care how many shares they own. The fact is they were the people who went to court to apply for an order to have the audit. When it was granted and it included the period they were managing the money, they now want to apply for a stay only to allow them the opportunity to send their people in there to conduct the audit. The way it will be done, from what we understand, an executive committee is formed that comprises some members of the Board because the Board cannot formally convene. So you use a backdoor thing, an executive committee, to get Mr. Boyce quasi-legally in there."
Paul Perriot, BCWU President
"So right now our stance is that we must do something and we are hoping that Dean Boyce and the Ashcroft people are watching this newscast tonight. We don't want him there tomorrow, he better not even show up at that gate, and I am telling my members that we will take some kind of action against him if he thinks that he will just walk into BTL yard just like that."
Dale Trujeque,
"If they are not prepared to work with us they have to bear in mind, they must bear in mind, and we ask the people of Belize to bear with us: we can have problems. We can have problems and this country has had too many problems caused by mistakes and I say that in quotation marks. Well we are human beings, subject to our frailties and our faults, we can commit mistakes too and we can keep repeating them on the rapid rate we are seeing them committed on the other side and in an exponential fashion in the same way. That is all we have to say."
And while the worker's representatives spoke specifically about the Boyce re-appearance, they want more than just having Ashcroft's man out of the company; they want to own the 37% of BTL shares that government claims it is holding for the Sunrise Group. Trujeque says they haven't got the cash but they are willing to sign a promissory note.
Dale Trujeque,
"Ih noh tek money fi give Sunrise or the Belizean people those shares. Give it to us as a gift nobody will manage it better. If you don't want to give it to us as a gift, the law says you can give it to us for $1. You don't want to do that, then if you could have given it to Prosser for a promissory note or two, give we for a promissory note, we ready; we have it prepared. We are ready to give them a promissory note for the 37%. I am serious."
Paul Perriot,
"Right now we are thinking through the whole process and we get to the point where we have to take some type of stand somewhere and live with that stand. We have to stand and we have to keep that stand going until we get what we want. As we are saying right now, the government has it in their hands. They could give we that part of it for some type of promissory note, it is there. So even if it is just the 37% now, that is where we want to start and then we could look at whatever else we could pickup afterwards. But without even that being offered to us, in the sense where we can go and get it, they are saying its there but they are not offering it to you. Its like they are talking to you but they are talking to somebody else behind your back so you don't know what is happening. The frustration I think that is what we need. I think we need to get people to a certain point where its uncontrollable and I think that is what the government of Belize needs. I think that is what the country of Belize needs and I think it needs to start somewhere. I don't think that I'll ask my members to stop it once it starts. Once it starts again we noh deh pan stop again and as I said, we hope that the Belizean public could understand what we di do and why we wah do it because at the end it will benefit us all as Belizeans."
Jules Vasquez,
So might we be looking at a national telephone shutdown Paul?
Paul Perriot,
"At the moment, as we always say, we can't disclose what plans we have put in place but we are going to membership to decide what exactly actions we will take and if it calls for a national shutdown, when it do happen again believe me Jules ih noh wah be a simple thing whe you could just brush back over again. It wont' be controllable."
Dire and serious threats from very ticked off workers...but if you can believe that is only a small part of the concerns surrounding the larger BTL picture tonight and it's a picture that has gotten progressively worse in the last 24 hours.
