Students take to streets against government

For those who are old enough to remember, it was a tactic lifted directly from the Heads of Agreement protests of 1981. Today cameraman George Tillett and I were in the thick of the latest political turmoil that bubbled through Belize City’s poshest part of town.

Janelle Chanona, Reporting
This afternoon, students of the University of Belize took to the streets once again, staging a walk-out from classes. But then in a move torn from the pages of history, student body president Moses Sulph and his supporters invaded the campuses of Saint John?s Junior College, E.P. Yorke High School and then Nazarene High.

As uniformed students abandoned their classrooms to join ranks, the students returned to Princess Margaret Drive and then head south straight to the gates of the Pallotti High.

Student Protester
?Power to the people. Pull up, pull up.?

As a nervous security guard attempts to keep the crowd back, the students push their way onto the campus.

Approximately two hundred students make their way onto the school grounds. As these pictures show, school officials attempt to inform U.B. Student Body President Moses Sulph that the young women will not be allowed to leave the campus.

Undeterred, the activists enter the classrooms, interrupting afternoon lessons to take their message to the students still sitting behind their desks.

A few students pack up as if to leave but in the end, the Pallotti girls stay behind.

Moses Sulph, President, U.B. Student Body
?We are fed up with the way the country is being run. And they are not listening to us, as people in this country, so we are fed up, so we have to go. We love this country and we?re standing for this country. That?s why we?re out here today, because we love this country.?

Janelle Chanona
?You?ve just invaded the campus of Pallotti High School, is that legal or illegal??

Moses Sulph
?I did not invade the campus; I just came with my students. I did not invade and we did not invade, we came along and that?s all that happened.?

Janelle Chanona
?You pushed the security guard aside, open the gates, and you came onto the campus.?

Moses Sulph
?No I man I cannot say that. I did not push any security guard whatsoever, the security guard opened the gates of his own free will and that?s the truth.?

First form teacher Liz Ramirez says the actions of the university students were disrespectful.

Liz Ramirez, Teacher, Pallotti High School
?This is the first time this has ever happened and the students were shocked and they were nervous. They felt guilty because they thought that because were not in support of it, cause they were telling them that if they didn?t go outside they won?t be supporting it. But I didn?t think that was the right way to, I think there was a right way and a wrong way to do it than just bursting into the classroom and telling the students come out was totally wrong.?

But among the crowd, it was hard to miss the political aspirants of the United Democratic Party cheering the students on.

Janelle Chanona
?Now we just heard you say, ?alright guys, let?s go, Sadie Vernon,? are you an organizer??

Edmund Castro, U.D.P. Aspirant, Bz. Rural North
?I?m not an organizer, I?m just a Belizean in the protest and I heard the echoing saying Sadie Vernon is the next stop, so I was telling some of the students Sadie Vernon.?

Janelle Chanona
?The P.U.P has long dismissed this whole scenario, the entire situation as politically motivated. You don?t feel that your presence might give them more fodder for that theory??

Edmund Castro
?Everything is politics in Belize currently. When you go when raise the price of fuel and you have to go to the gas station and pay sixty cents increase today, sixty cents increase tomorrow, that is politics. When you have to pay more for a price of a loaf of bread it?s politics because it is because of their corruption that caused us to have those high prices. So what you are seeing here today is the students taking upon themselves as a Belizean to show their protest and dissent with what is going on in the country.?

Student Protesters
?We love Belize. We love Belize.?

As the students made their way up Princess Margaret Drive, random interviews with the demonstrators showed that some of the young people were personally aware of the national crisis; others were feeding off the mob mentality.

Janelle Chanona
?Why did you leave the library??

Student, Nazarene High School
?The library, because I wanted to protest.?

Janelle Chanona
?Why do you want to protest??

Student
?Because I believe that we have rights and those rights are very like…violated–cut off the lights, cut out all our phones and I think that?s not fair.?

Janelle Chanona
?So you are protesting against B.T.L. or for B.T.L.??

Student
?I?m protesting for B.T.L. because I believe we need phones.?

Student, St. John?s College
?The president come dah we class and say that we should left the school and the teacher seh that the school should support the union and if the students no left from the school, the union might come down hard pan the school and so now I support this whole thing.?

Janelle Chanona
?But is that intimidation??

Student, St. John?s College
?Yes I feel that is intimidation yes.

Janelle Chanona
?So you feel it?s wrong??

Student, St. John?s College
?It?s intimidation, yes. It?s intimidation, but it?s good because if you noh do it that way, they noh wah come out. They no really have intention to harm the students, but it’s just wah effective method to get them to come out.?

Student, E.P. Yorke High
?This is how I define democracy and freedom of speech. This dah my freedom of speech, that?s all I want to define at this moment.?

Near the entrance of the Saint John?s College Junior College, the Officer Commanding for the Crimes Investigation Branch, Chester Williams, and Assistant Compol Crispin Jeffries attempt to detain a student protestor.

Angered, the students physically prevent the police from detaining their peer.

Student
?I was just walking holding the Belize flag and Mr. Jeffries grab me for no reason. I?m just supporting the Belizean people; this is what we should have been doing a long time ago.?

As the students demonstrate in front of the B.T.L. compound, the police riot squad stands at the ready.

But then the students keep walking, right up to the Prime Minister?s private residence.

Student Protestors
?Set Belize free! Set Belize free! ?

And that?s where they would stay for approximately one hour, engaging the police at several points.

Asst. Crispin Jeffries, Head, Eastern Division
?Children, children there is a provision in law for you to parade and procession. You have a right, do not violate that right. You have a right, do not violate that right. You have a right to protest, but there is a procedure. You are being warned that this is an illegal gathering and you have conducted an illegal procession. Children you have conducted and illegal procession and this is now an illegal gathering. You are being warned. You have a right, do not abuse that right. Exercise your rights, exercise your rights, move away peacefully, move away peacefully. You have exercised that right, you have been warned.?

Crispin Jeffries (To Ch. 7 cameraman)
?Move your camera out of my face. Do not abuse your rights to take photographs, keep your distance. Do not abuse your rights to take photographs, keep your distance.?

The students would play haul and pull with police preventing the flow of traffic as they stood in the streets, and as king motorists to show support by honking their horns.

Paul Perriott, Pres., Bz. Communication Workers Union
?This dah Belizean power, people power. People di show that they ready fu show support wah real Belizean movement.?

As police plot their strategy, U.D.P. Party Leader Dean Barrow arrives at the scene.

Janelle Chanona
?Why are you out here Mr. Barrow??

Dean Barrow, Party Leader, U.D.P.
?Just to try and make sure that the rights of the children and the students are protected.?

Janelle Chanona
?But they have admitted that they don?t have a permit to protest. This is an illegal demonstration.

Dean Barrow, Party Leader, U.D.P.
?I just want to be sure that the police doesn?t try to rough up any of the kids, that?s my concern.?

Janelle Chanona
?How would you define civil disobedience?

Dean Barrow, Party Leader, U.D.P.
?This is civil disobedience except the U.D.P. isn?t responsible for this; this is the kids acting on their own.?

The People?s United Party says not so.

Yasser Musa, P.U.P. Spokesman
?For Mr. Barrow to be in front of the Prime Minister?s residence today with many of his so call candidates for the next supposed elections; this phantom election that he wants to have. Look, tomorrow the Prime Minister can ask his party supporters to assemble in front of Dean Barrow?s house, that?s nothing magnificent, what are we trying to accomplish there. We can have party supporters assembled in front of his law firm, what is that going to accomplish? So from a party standpoint I believe the Prime Minister has been very restrained. We have to put in context the violent behaviour of the United Democratic Party on January eighteenth as we recall. They incited their supporters to stone at the police. Everybody saw that on TV. Again Sunday night, paid thugs were hired to stone the Prime Minister?s residence. So now they are going to come out there in this neat and clean master of the games mentality that Mr. Barrow likes to perpetuate and say that he is a king and saviour of the students. No man. People need to know that the former president of St. John?s Junior College, Carlos Perdomo, who was out there in front of the P.M.?s residence as well, he is the former president of St. John?s College. That corridor that they took the students out of their classrooms, St. John, Nazarene, as I understand it, those are high school students. No man, this is a very sick situation that the United Democratic Party has taken in terms of trying to use a volatile and potentially unsafe situation and place the kids in harms way. I think parents should be outraged at that.?