Airport workers accuse foreign company of racism
Over the past several weeks we have carried a number of stories which question what appears to be institutionalized harassment of Hispanic immigrants by authorities. Today we turn our camera to racism of another type: employment discrimination against Afro-Belizeans in favor of Hispanic workers from beyond our borders. Patrick Jones reports.
They are not a group of happy young men. Reason is they are the latest additions to the country’s list of unemployed. Deyca International, the Venezuelan company that is constructing the new terminal building and parallel taxiway at the Philip Goldson International Airport, last week terminated the services of the men.
Reginald Gordon, Retrenched
“All weh we know, them come give we fi we pay and tell we fu we service no longer needed an thing and them get some aliens fu replace we. Each black man weh they let go, they get two aliens and thing. A no really know weh di go on. First time I see so much rude bwai and gang-banger as a seh di work and they tek weh man honest living and put them back out here pon the street fu kill somebody.”
While the laid off workers cry foul, project engineer Mario Gonzalez says that with the upbeat progress of the projects, his company had no other alternative but to start down-sizing.
Mario Gonzales, Project Engineer
“The project always start slow then gets very high. The production of the works, that’s when you need more of the people – the force – the labor force. In that time we actually hired people here, about three hundred people at one time. We have a lot of people working during the whole project, the average in the entire project has been more than two hundred people at any time – most of them or all of them Belizean, except Michael Angelo and of course myself. And you know it comes to a time when you need to start reducing the personnel because there is not much job you need to do and when you are in finishing you can’t have a lot of people to do that work. You need to start reducing, and that’s why I really understand those people, but there is nothing we can do.”
While company officials say it is prudent business practice that forced the decision to terminate the workers, the young men have issued a stinging indictment of their former boss, on charges of racism.
Kent Skeet, Retrenched
“You got some Spanish weh we di work wid, weh they the pay twenty eight dollars and twenty seven dollars a day, boss. Da lone dat di go on right now. If you go up there right now you could count the black man dem weh deh up there. You could count them and at taxi way, we mi deh pan one site one. Off of site one da lone Spanish. All di black man get fired yesterday, when we reach da work yesterday, you money ready fu yuh.”
Q: “The international workers you are talking about, are those from Venezuela?”
Mario Gonzales
“No, from Venezuela it’s only Michael Angelo and myself. We got a few people from Central America that live in Belize. They are resident in Belize and they have work permit and these people have been working and they have done very good works here and I think that’s good for Belize and for the project also.”
According to Gonzalez, the new domestic terminal building is eighty percent complete while roughly seventy percent of the expansion of the arrival lounge has been finished. The engineers say overall construction is on target for completion by the end of June.
Patrick Jones
“As the project nears completion, company executives say it is time to start winding down and that would mean they cannot maintain the same work force as when the project was in full swing. But those who were among the first to go, don’t seem to understand the principle.”
Anthony Paterson, Retrenched
“Up to today day we no know why we get fired. Up to fu we site supe don’t know why. He said he don’t know how he no get let go too, laid off, whatsoever. Dem chance us, all right.”
Q: “So there is work to do and you guys want to work?”
Ryan Sosa, Retrenched
“We want to work, boss. They have like two months and a half more work to do.”
Kent Skeet
“If we never di work boss we could understand why they fire we. To me personally, I think da cheap labor, because when we work Saturday they have to pay we time and a half. Da dat them di run from.”
Mario Gonzales
“The payment comes, depend on the skill of the workers, doesn’t matter if its international or not. We pay for same skilled work, the same rate so it really doesn’t matter for us. It’s what we want is quality and we’ll pay for that quality.”
Michael Angelo, Resident Engineer
“In general everything coming smooth. I open di market for a lot of citizens in Belize. Now at this stage they are, we have to be reduce a little bit the person because the job is already almost finish.”
While the arguments from the engineers may amount to competent business sense, there is little that anyone can say to a man who has just lost his job, to convince him that it was done for all the right reasons. Patrick Jones, for News Five.
The terminal buildings and apron are costing six million U.S. dollars while the parallel taxiway is being built at a cost of four million dollars.
