After the UDP left the House chambers, the media met the Leader of the Opposition at the bottom of the National Assembly stairs. He explained the reason for the walk out - that his party would not tolerate that level of disrespect from Julius Espat, especially since the party believes that there were racist undertones to his statement. Here's how he put it.
Hon. Patrick Faber, Leader of the Opposition
"While I will give the Speaker credit for addressing the matter, she has certainly engaged the situation and has made a pronouncement even to say that the language consistently used by the member for Cayo South is out of order, she goes no further than to strike it off the record and does not demand this man to apologize and as a result of that he embolden and he feels that he can do it every time. Look at the last time when he referred to my colleague from Mesopotamia as a jailbird or something like that - completely unparliamentarily and again, that matter should have been dealt with by asking him to apologize. What happened then was that it was struck off the record. This man is a repeat offender and as a result today he brings it up again, because he feels that it is okay and so if the Speaker will not take it as far as demand an apology and I apologized to the Speaker to the public right now for my retort just now said what if would call you gial. But that was just to make the point that it is unacceptable. I would never get away with calling the speaker gial, so how is it that the prime minister himself has done it and in fact the member from Cayo South continues to do it call me bouy and nobody demands an apology. It is disrespectful and we will not tolerate that kind of behavior."
Jules Vasquez, reporter
"Sir, I heard the member for Mesopotamia mentioning there that it has racist undertones as well."
Hon. Patrick Faber, Leader of the Opposition
"If it were coming from him, it can be nothing else. As I said this morning I made a point about his actions in chairing the constitution and foreign affairs committee which you will understand is very important. All the constitutional amendments have got to go that committee and you see now that there is a tenth amendment bill that is being put forward. If we in the opposition can't sit around a table with this man, because he is so obnoxious, how is it that we will get on to good government and so Julius Espat has got to be put on arraigned, somebody has gpt to reel him. He is out of order and he is not what this country needs for good governance."
Jules Vasquez, reporter
"Sir, is it a matter that you've been in politics and public life a long time, people call you all kinds of things, you can't be walking out of the house because they call you a name you don't like or a name that you find offensive."
Hon. Patrick Faber, Leader of the Opposition
"If it were me alone, maybe I'd tolerate it, but it is the 70% of this population that are young people, much younger than I many of them that see the disrespect when he does that. Yes, I am one of the younger members of parliament, but I am senior to him any day in terms of the number of years and the number of times that people have elected me and it is not me, it is the office that I hold which is a duly elected member, 5 time elected member of the Collet constituency and the duly elected selected leader of the opposition as well."
Faber was backed up by his political colleague, Shyne Barrow, who was the first to call out Espat on his racism from inside the House meeting. Barrow noted that Espat did not even take the opportunity to deny his comment was racist.
Jules Vasquez, reporter
"Do you think it is a term boy is a term of belittlement or it is a tone of a racist put down, because you were talking about racism?"
Hon. Shyne Barrow, Area Rep., Mesopotamia
"Yes, it is both and I got several texts from people in my constituency outraged and they felt immediately that it was racial coming from him and I just think I could be wrong and that's why I ask Madam Speaker to ask him to apologize, because if it was not racial and the leader of the opposition and I had raised it to Madam Speaker then he could have clarified that and said no I never mean anything racist by that and clarify himself, so on either grounds I believe he is out of order, but certainly people in my constituency feel that he was being racist."
