The Belize Communication Workers for Justice were back out on the streets this morning, protesting in front of their former employers' corporate headquarters.
As we told you, the CCJ made a ruling ordering BTL to pay severance even to workers who had gotten a pension.
BTL has agreed to pay one batch of employees - at the cost of about 10 million dollars, but have not done so for this older group - which may cost another 10 - 12 million.
But - with h3 company looking to fork over 80 million for Speednet - these former employees aren't backing down until they get it. And while their group is small, their message is loud. Courtney Menzies was on the ground this morning and has this story.
The Belize Communication Workers for Justice have not given up the fight for severance from BTL. Though they participated in the UDP's protest against the acquisition yesterday, they were in front of BTL today with the second round of picketing the corporate headquarters of the business where many of them worked for decades.
According to their rep, Emily Turner, they wanted to protest for the entire week but were denied on most days, and she believes their voices are being stifled.
Emily Turner, BCWJ Rep
"What they did inform us is the we got Thursday and if we wanted Friday we could apply. So we applied on Tuesday giving them 48 hours that is required by the law. Yesterday they informed us they're denying that for us as well. So we have today, yesterday we appealed it to the Commissioner of Police because we're saying that you cannot take away this right from us, you have to tell us why. I understand they may stretched thin but this is the law, we have the right to protest, so we have appealed it to him, they made contact that they acknowledged it so we right now are waiting hear what will be the result of that appeal."
"As you guys have seen, this is very peaceful protest, nobody is running in there, the police are even falling asleep because it's not a big group, we're not a big group, we are an older group of people and we just want to make this known, we have to make this known because if we didn't do this, a lot of these people would be suffering in silence while these companies are raped and abused and big people like Michael Ashcroft, they start coming back to get money from companies like BTL."
And they're hoping they get approved for tomorrow since they haven't heard any word from BTL. They're expecting an answer tomorrow but they believe that with the CCJ ruling, the matter of their severance shouldn't even be up for debate.
Emily Turner, BCWJ Rep
"We haven't gotten any indication that they are changing their position. On last week Friday, they did write us and tell us to give them until February 6th which is tomorrow and so that they are reviewing with attorneys and they will get back to us. So we wrote them back Tuesday and we told them what are you going to get a mere attorney to go and interpret the ruling of a CCJ? Where you had very experienced judges of the Caribbean Court of Justice of Caricom where we all recognize as the highest court? What are these mere attorneys gonna say that will be different than what these people have already said? So we said no, we don't want to hear what you're interpretations are, we just want to know when these checks are going to be ready so we can then organize our people so we can come and collect them."
Michael Augustus, BCWJ Rep
"The severance is already a debt that is there. What happened? Your pockets are already getting weak, you want to weaken it more with 80 to 100 million dollars to give away?"
But Turner says even if they receive a favorable answer tomorrow, that won't bring an end to their action:
Emily Turner, BCWJ Rep
"We do have another issue we have to address with the Belize Tax Service where they now came and said, because we understand that they were calling BTL to tell them, when they heard about the judgement and that BTL would settle, they started calling, you need to send our tax, we're waiting for our tax, what's that all about?"
"We will continue advocating, there's a lot of information, like myself, I was in this industry 25 years as a software engineer and I understand acquisitions, I have worked alongside in strategic positions to validate these things, especially in the technical area, so we will be continuing our attending morning shows and sharing information. We need to continue speaking on this issue and this group will remain together so that we could continue talking about that. I believe that we want to continue being vanguards of these national issues."
Michael Augustus, BCWJ Rep
"BCWJ will be here for the long haul, we are here for workers, not only the workers in BTL, we're here for workers for each and every one of you and your families who work to make a living. We are here for everyone."
And they're hoping that the Belize Communications Workers Union whose members work inside these corporate headquarters, and which they helped to establish, will join them.
Emily Turner, BCWJ Rep
"Their money was set up so that the Belize Communications Workers Union of today could have that, we passed that on to them. We have asked them for their support and I can say that we are disappointed because all we see is them peeping through the windows and they are supposed to be doing a poll like a survey to see if they will come out and support. I think it will be sad if we end up finishing this and they do not show up."
