So, what's his fix for the Teachers Union? As we showed you last night, they are not relenting on their stance against corruption in public life, and on Monday, the union will stage be a mass demonstration in Belmopan - which means many teachers will be out of their classrooms.
Today, the Prime Minister was careful not to put down the BNTU, but he said that he does not agree with their drastic action:
Rt., Hon. Dean Barrow - Prime Minister of Belize
"While as I said I respect their right to strike, certainly it occurs to me that the issues agitated by that campaign do not constitute a labor dispute. I would therefore feel and go on record as saying that they should address those issues by way of demonstrations, by way of protests meetings, public ways of showing their discontent or concern. But they should not shutdown classes, they should not discontinue teaching our children. Precisely because, in any case, whatever the rationale for the teachers deciding to become militant, always we have to ask that the view as paramount the interest of the children. But especially because it appears that the concentration of their focus and effort is on these social issues, these political issues. I would ask that their response, that their mobilization, that their actions stop short of not teaching the children."
He also shared his opinion that their stance is political, but unlike his Deputy Prime Minister, Barrow stressed that he does not believe that they are following a PUP agenda:
Reporter
"Do you believe that this is politically motivated sir?"
Rt., Hon. Dean Barrow - Prime Minister of Belize
"Not politically motivated in a partisan way; no. I will not say that. Look for me, you are not going to get anything said that can ever be interpreted as any disrespect for the B.N.T.U. I stand by my position that the strictly social and political issues raised in their letter - and I repeat not political in a partisan way, but they are political in the larger sense of the meaning of the word. I do stand by my position that those issues do not constitute a labor dispute and so there is a whole question of whether the strike legally is justified. But it is pointless to get into that because it will happen and there is nothing government wants to do to oblige the unions not to proceed in the way they are determined to go. We will see to persuade it. And we would hope that BNTU would not sacrifice that common preoccupation, that common urgent consideration on the alter of their political, not partisan, activity in pursuit of the demands they have made via their Stand up for Belize campaign."
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