C.W.U. Looks for Support from N.T.U.C.B.

Evan “Mose” Hyde

In an attempt to further resist the Labor Department, the C.W.U. called for solidarity from its umbrella union, the National Trade Union Congress of Belize.  They asked the N.T.U.C.B. to represent to recuse himself from his seat on the Tribunal so it could not meet its quorum. Now Hyde says only the Labor Department can say when this protest will come to an end.

Evan “Mose” Hyde, President, C.W.U.

“The National trade Union Congress of Belize, on the request of CWU, decided, had a vote and the majority unions took the position that they would hold a position of solidarity with us and asked for the director of the N.T.U.C.B.to recuse himself from the Tribunal, therefore taking away quorum. That’s our position that we have.    I know that the Union is asking of the Government to be responsible, and to comply with its commitment that it made on July twenty-first to facilitate and mediate a negotiation between the Union and P.B.L.  As we expressed yesterday to the members of the Tribunal, we have no problem with the Tribunal; our protest is not to the Tribunal. Our protest is to the Ministry of Labor., who gathered us together, we discussed the situation, and agreed, committed to a process, and we are keeping them to that agreement they made with us on July twenty-first.”

Paul Lopez

“Is the Tribunal, however, not an alternate approach to the same end that the negotiations would have brought about?”

Evan “Mose” Hyde

“We have an agreement with the Ministry of Labor and we are keeping them to that agreement. We believe that the effort to evade that is extremely unacceptable. We have never experienced that type of what we call back peddling before, on a very critical matter. When we made certain decision, post July twenty-first, it was based on that agreement. Now we don’t want you to change your decision, because what we feel is that this is something you have kind of schemed out.”