And, while the unions were calling names in their speech last night, today the Association of Beneficiaries and Retired Public Officers conducted nationwide picketing in the district towns and cities.
The last time they peacefully protested it was in front of the Eleanor Hall building in February, but today they were downtown at battlefield park with a much larger crowd.
They are protesting what they call Government's, the BNTU's and the PSU'S failure to terminate the Public Sector Workers Trust as requested by the Beneficiaries.
These former public servants - many of them are now past the age of retirement - but they say the money in the trust is theirs as the rightful beneficiaries.
We visited th protest in the Battlefield Park today:
Glenfield Dennison, Attorney, Union Senator
"This cause is one where former public officers who have given their entire lives and career to the service of the government and the people of Belize are literally dying before they are able to collect on a benefit that is theirs. This trust has been set up for so long and they have not been benefitting. So the cry of these retired public officers are simply this listen we are ill, we are ailing, our colleagues have died and we need the proceeds and the benefits of this trust and so I think that cause is a cause that anyone who would just process it would have to get behind I don't know what greater sacrifice one can give them to die in the service of their country without getting your benefits, most of the public officers out here are 30+ years employees of the government and that's why I decided I have to join the cause and I laughed this morning when one of the retirees asked me you can't be old enough to have retired and I said no but this is a cause that I firmly believe in."
Burndina Ek, Retired Public Officer, ABPRO
"Two I stand here and I ask and I plea on behalf of my colleagues here, FEED US! We need our money. Yes you all came up with a so called project and that so called, I am quoting that."
"But look at that, look at the walking stick, look at the wheel chair behind me, many of us have to limp our way out here and we still haven't gotten our money and we are hungry, we need to eat. So I call on you ministers, prime minister and the young minister, Minister Usher, you are our shepherd and we are your flock, do as Christ said and feed your people. Coming up with a gardening project and this project for that, how will you tell me to come to a gardening project when I can barely bend down, what am I going to do in agriculture and what not? Give us our money and let us at least live with a meagre amount to buy our food."
ABRPO calls on the Prime Minister to heed the call of retired public officers for the urgent dissolution of the Public Sector Workers Trust.
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