While teachers will show their strength on Tuesday in Belmopan, this morning, the capital was also the venue for another protest. A group of students staged a small protest over government’s decision to cut off subsidies to the university. They say they want government to re-instate the funding because fees are unaffordable to new students. […]
The University of Belize’s sixteenth commencement exercise was held at the Central Campus in Belmopan on Saturday. Four hundred and eighty students graduated and of that amount three hundred and thirty, roughly sixty-eight percent, were females. The President of the University of Belize, Doctor Cary Fraser congratulated the graduates while the guest speaker and Director […]
The last day for late registration for the University of Belize is this Monday. On that day the student body represented by Nation Builders also plans a demonstration in the nation’s capital. That is because the government is no longer providing a subsidy for new students entering UB. In a letter dated January twenty first, […]
The Saint Catherine Academy hosted a science fair this morning; bright minds from eight different schools from the city were invited to observe the fair. The science projects covered a number of topics and were put together by students of all forms. News Five Jose Sanchez was also on hand to look at the work […]
There is a steely resolve tonight by the Belize National Teachers Union, the Public Service Union and the Association of Public Service Senior Managers, known as the Joint Unions Negotiating Team, to stage a national demonstration this Tuesday while Cabinet is meeting in Belmopan. The unions have not yet received the required permit for what […]
On Wednesday, Minister of National Security John Saldivar, area representative for Belmopan, issued a response denouncing statements made by the Joint Unions Negotiating Team that a letter to meet with his constituents, particularly members of the Belize National Teachers Union, was a blatant act of union-busting. Despite a rather anemic attendance at the meeting, […]
The head of the Belmopan Branch of the Belize National Teachers Union, Corland Galvez and her membership are up in arms over a letter from the Ministry of Education authorizing the closure of schools at noon today. The letter asked parents pick up their children because teachers would be attending a meeting with Minister of […]
More than twenty scholarships will be made available by the government of Taiwan to Belizean students for the upcoming academic year. The areas of study for either a bachelor or masters degree are varied and recipients will also have the opportunity to study mandarin. At a briefing this morning, the Taiwanese head of Mission, walked […]
What does the Minister of National Security have to do with the salary adjustments that teacher’s have been pressing for over the past years? We don’t know either but John Saldivar has successfully lobbied the Ministry of Education to cancel classes in the nation’s capital on Wednesday afternoon so he can meet with teachers who […]
While News Five spoke to the president of the Belmopan branch, the national President of the B.N.T.U. Luke Palacio was in a session with the President of the Public Service Union Marilyn Blades and the President of the Association of Public Service Senior Managers Jose Castellanos. This meeting also took place in the capital. The […]
The planned demonstration and possible strike are not the only issues facing the Ministry of Education. The Association of Student Governments of the University of Belize is resisting a cut in government subsidies to the university which means that registration fees for new students stand to go up. The association has written to Minister Faber […]
The hundreds of millions in dollars of relief brought by a restructured bond may have given teachers hope that the government will be able to grant pending salary adjustments. But the Prime Minister has crushed all hopes of those salary increases occurring in the near future. Following today’s press conference with the chairman of the […]
With the impending national demonstration and possible strike action at government’s front door, Patrick Faber, who leads a ministerial committee on collective bargaining agreement with the unions, said last Friday that government does not have the finances to support the adjustment. This morning, Faber likened the adjustment to an increase and further warned that it […]
Minister Faber was also asked about payment made to gangs, either for the truce or to keep the peace in the aftermath of the slaughter of four George Street Gang affiliates two weeks ago. Specifically, how is it that there are resources for gangs but not for public officers? Here is his response. Patrick […]
Teachers countrywide have voted resoundingly to hold a national demonstration in Belmopan on January twenty-ninth. And if that doesn’t get government’s attention, then they are prepared to go on strike. The biggest issue on the table is a salary adjustment of thirty percent requested by teachers due to the high cost of living. Government says […]
Negotiations for a collective bargain agreement have been ongoing since 2008, but teachers are unhappy that they have not been able to move forward on the thirty percent salary adjustment .With that threat looming ahead for the government, Minister Patrick Faber, who is the head of the ministerial negotiation team says that government has been […]
As the clock ticks toward February twenty-ninth, Faber says the ministerial committee is not planning on meeting again until the next scheduled meeting because he believes there is no impasse. Still yet, the Prime Minister is expected to make a presentation to the nation next week providing details of the economic picture. Patrick Faber, […]
For the past few weeks the leadership of the Belize National Teachers Union has been calling on its members to attend an important meeting to discuss critical issues. Those issues include the collective bargaining agreement, crime, the economy and the ICJ. Now, when the B.N.T.U. gathers en masse and with serious issues like these on […]
Minister of Education, Patrick Faber, came under fire recently because of a decision by the Ministry to discontinue the subsidy given to new students registering at the University of Belize. It’s a decision which has caused no end of anxiety with students who say that without the government subsidy, they simply won’t be able to […]
On January tenth, C.E.O. in the Ministry of Health, Dr. Peter Allen was caught in an altercation with a veteran nurse in Belmopan, and today he was again the center of controversy involving nurses. A group of nurses gathered on the University of Belize Campus in protest after they claimed that Allen arbitrarily cancelled both […]
The economies of Belize and other countries in the region have been in the forefront of discussions in recent years, as global realities have forced governments to adjust, adapt or face economic devastation. In Belize the situation is no different, and the future economic story of our nation is by no means written in stone. […]
Do the Right Thing, is a youth oriented program devised by the Community Policing Unit. It looks for at-risk youths to recognize and invest in their future by awarding them scholarships. The 2010 third place winner, Micah Goodin was a poet whose thirst for thought provoking words, became quenched by advocacy. Goodin became a founding […]
You heard the National Youth Program Coordinator mention that Goodin was the poster boy for the Do the Rait Thing Program. And though there was no malice and only a depleted program that caused the loss of the scholarship, the student blasted both his school and the youth program. Micah Goodin, Lost Scholarship “Both […]
Schools and businesses will go back to schedule on Wednesday but this morning the downtown and south side areas closed down. Fearing the worst, parents picked up their children from various schools and to ensure the safety of employees, businesses pulled down their shutters. News Five’s Delahnie Bain has that story. Delahnie Bain, Reporting […]
Today was registration day at the University of Belize Belmopan campus and there are over five hundred incoming students who were expected to sign up and pay for the upcoming semester. But when News Five spoke to the Student Government President, Hope Amadi, today, there was only a handful of students completing their registrations. Amadi […]
