And today, two UDP representatives are pleading with teachers to go back to the classroom, and with parents to send their children back to school. Michael Finnegan and Tracy Taegar-Panton – who we met two weeks ago trying to tell teachers in their constituency not to strike – held a press conference today, encouraging teachers individually to abandon the strike and return to their classrooms. They said the government has done its part, and now it’s time for the teachers to do theirs:…
Hon. Tracy Taegar-Panton - Albert Representative
"There is no reason for this to continue. They have received, they have gotten the assurance and commitment at specific time frame, specific date that the government has provided in which this governance agenda will be advanced."
"The government of Belize has listened, the government of Belize compromised; the government of Belize has acceded to several of the concerns that were raised by the BNTU in terms of the 8 point agenda, almost all of them. And so I was hopeful that would signal an end to the strike. There is a measure disappointment that I feel that today the children of the Albert constituency continue to be out of school. It has been a long time, it has been 10 days; the children also have a right to an education. I think there are several ways in which we can advance any negotiation but my appeal to the teachers and my appeal to the parents is that it's time for our children to be back in school."
Hon. Michael Finnegan - Mesop. Representative
"To my mind most of these matters were dealt with and I think the government bent back over to the BNTU so as to settle this matter so as to get our children back in school and I was totally dismayed or I should not use the word, I should use the word lugubrious. It has become lugubrious Jules and as far as I am concerned and we are right back where we started and this is why we come here today, Tracy and I as representative to appeal to the teachers, the BNTU to let us resolve this matter, let us come back again to the table with the prime minister, let us work out this situation and let our children get back into school."
"The teachers have to find another strong way to protest and to make their voices be heard rather than to keep the children of Belize out of school."
Now, two weeks ago when we met these two canvassing the schools in their divisions, we asked if it would amount to failure if their efforts did not avert the strike. Well it didn’t; the strike rolled on through its ninth day today. But, Taegar still claimed that her intervention was successful in Albert:..
Hon. Tracy Taegar-Panton - Albert Representative
"I thought we passed with an A+ in the Albert division as you know we have 135 teachers and 109 of them reported to work and has been reporting to work since the day of the strike."
Jules Vasquez
"That's because you have an Adventist school."
Hon. Tracy Taegar-Panton - Albert Representative
"We have an Adventist school, we have a Methodist school, we have private schools, we have high schools, we have a 6th form and the teachers that have shown up to work every single day I want to publicly thank those teachers who put our children first. I want to also say that a lot of parents after they got through the first 3 days realise that is was time to send their children back to school and a lot of their parents; we didn't have 100% and I wouldn't go there but a lot of the parents started to send their children back to school and I'm appealing to them that the teachers are in school, the teachers are waiting to engage your kids and I'm asking you to kindly send your kids to school."
Finnegan says Queen Square Anglican and Grace Primary in his division also remained open.
We note that today in Orange Walk parents protested in front of La Inmaculada school for the second day in a row. We counted close to 30 parents. We expect this to continue and possibly intensify next week.
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