Teachers Accuse M.O.E. of Dictating to and Intimidating Teachers

So, why can’t the union give in to Faber’s request and reduce its attendance to five executives?  According to B.N.T.U. President Luke Palacio, government does not have a bearing on who can or cannot participate in the meeting when the council of management is the representative body for the various branches of the union.  The standoff, he says, also sets the tone for Saturday’s rally.

Luke Palacio, National President, B.N.T.U.

“We are a democratic organization, we practice good governance, we stand up for good governance and the bottom line remains that we speak for our membership.  Our membership has elected those persons you see here to represent them on a council of management, all those teachers that would be affected with this decision that the honorable minister has taken to dock their salaries because they were able to stand up, they were able to make things happen in Belize that have never been seen before, he has decided that he wants to punish them.  We are going to stand by the side of our members, we are going to stand by the side of our teachers and we are saying, he cannot, and I will repeat, he cannot dictate to us who will represent us at any meeting with him.  We have not said to him you bring yourself and only your C.E.O. or your Chief Education Officer.  He is the one who has decided that he wants five persons to be there, yet they continue to give instructions to their district center managers and other persons employed in the ministry to continue to threaten and intimidate our teachers.  We have the mandate from our teachers to defend them and we will defend them to the fullest.”

Luke Palacio

Isani Cayetano

“How does it set the tone for tomorrow’s event?”

Luke Palacio

“It sets a very good tone, in fact.  I think that even those who are thinking of not coming tomorrow will decide to come because they are seeing that their union is taking a stance based on our constitution.  The union is standing up for our teachers, the union is not backing down and that I think is a very important message.  We have said it before and we are going to say it again, the teachers have indicated that they are prepared to make up the time.  What is Minister Faber’s problem?”