I.M.F. Meets with Union Leaders on State of the Economy

Dean Flowers

Earlier this week, the International Monetary Fund (I.M.F.) met with union leaders on the state of the economy from their perspective. As an affiliate of the National Trade Union Congress of Belize, the Public Service Union was also invited to the meeting. President Dean Flowers says it is his third year of participating and that nothing came out of the meeting.

Dean Flowers, President, Public Service Union

“Really it is just a dialogue where we are economically, the opportunities that exist, the constraints that the country is under and the fiscal policies that can be adopted for the future. So it is not really a conversation to uncover anything.  I think, for the most part, the I.M.F. normally uncovers things based on what we say to them. They spoke a little bit about the economy, of course, the economic development of the country thus far since their last visit and debt reduction. Then of course the heavy talk that they normally want to bring at us is the public sector pension reform and the wage bill. And we said to them what we say to them every single year. Belize does not have any problem where meeting its wage bill is concerned if it is that our government would spend the revenues that they collect efficiently. And so we remain absolutely steadfast that we would rather die, defending our pension than to engage in any discussion surrounding public sector pension reform that does not also come with political and tax reform.”

The super bond and the blue bond were also discussed during the meeting.