Also making an appearance today were a small number of BTL workers. Of course, the vesting bill involves them, as when it becomes law, all those 400 plus BTL employees will be working for a new company called Belize Telemedia Limited. One Minister characterized it as the same person in different clothes, but for Communication Workers General Secretary Christine Perriot, it's not that simple. She says her union's members have not been adequately informed.
Christine Perriot, BCWU - General Secretary
"They haven't come to the union, they haven't come to the people. They know that it is a big concern there and they just refuse to acknowledge that we have a concern. We are already dealing with, we don't know who BTL belongs to, well we know for sure now that Ashcroft and Boyce and them are not there lawfully and now these same unlawful people are writing an agreement for themselves. How does the Prime Minister allow that? How does he meddle into private affairs? He did it with the UHS and then he is going like okay he is listening to the people and he is not going to do that again but here he goes signing the Act for Telemedia.
BTL is a private sector, it is not a public thing and government has no share, not even one. So what business they have in the House making a law Keith that will give Ashcroft all this authority and this Act isn't waiting on any court or any Bill - everything is deemed that the day the Governor General sign it, everything is deemed under Telemedia only.
My thing is that here I am, I am employee of BTL. I cannot even go to lobby. They haven't given me back my benefits, they are not even paying me my salary. The government is not doing anything about the three guys that got terminated when they breached the collective agreement. We are here abiding by the law and waiting for government to help us and then you have an unlawful person in the company and they are supporting them more. So my thing is the Prime Minister Said Musa is not there for us. He says he is there for the Belizean people, hell no. He is not there for us. He is only there for a bunch of cronies."
