Former BTL Workers Ramp Up Pressure for Severance

Former employees demanding long‑awaited severance pay are once again turning up the pressure on Belize Telemedia Limited. Members of the Belize Communications Workers for Justice say they’re expecting a response from BTL as early as tomorrow, and while they wait, they took their protest back to the company’s headquarters today. News Five’s Shane Williams was there and has our story.

 

Shane Williams, Reporting

The Belize Communications Workers for Justice, now representing more than one hundred and seventy former BTL employees, is demanding long‑overdue severance pay, despite a clear ruling from the Caribbean Court of Justice. Protesters took to the streets with signs and chants, urging BTL to settle what it owes and warning that big corporate plans, including the proposed Speednet acquisition, shouldn’t come before paying workers. Led by former union presidents Emily Turner and Michael Augustus, the message was quite simple: pay up and pay now.

 

Emily Turner, Organizer, Belize Communication Workers for Justice

“We haven’t gotten any indication that they’re changing their position. Let me say a little, on last week Friday, they did write us and ask us to give them until February 6^th, which is tomorrow. And so that they are reviewing with attorneys and they will get back to us. So we said, no we don’t, we don’t want to hear what your interpretations are. We just want to know when these checks are gonna be ready, so that we can then organize our people to come and collect them.”

 

Michael Augustus, Organizer, Belize Communication Workers for Justice

“This little cushion is for you to go there into pasture. That’s exactly what the CCJ said and to carry on. Now you are old. Nobody wants to hire you. You’re not as employable as you used to be. And so that cushion that they’re taking away, that is rightfully legally for the employees, give it to them.”

 

That figure is still increasing as more former employees seek payment. BTL stopped paying severance from as far back as 1994, when the contributory pension scheme was introduced. Chairman Markhelm Lizarraga has cited fourteen million dollars, but the BCWJ says the figure could be much higher.

 

Emily Turner

“We hope that by tomorrow they can know what that number is. And I think it’s very important that even right now that we’re having a discussion about the acquisition, it’s important that we know how much is it that BTL owes. BTL cannot be wanting to spend eighty million dollars and doesn’t want to recognize and know the amount of this debt. That is very irresponsible. They have to know, is it fourteen million? Because that’s where the chairman was. But now because he wasn’t settling with these people, that may double. But it could, it could be fifty million. We need to know the number.”

 

While the workers who helped build the company continue picketing for what they’re owed, two issues sting the most, especially the millions BTL is accused of spending on legal fees to fight their severance claims.

 

Emily Turner

“So now imagine, when the chairman gave his number he said fourteen million dollars to settle the people – the people that are eligible. So that’s under six years. You paid more for legal fees than the people you paid for the people you want to settle with. Really, but yes, it is very sad. It is an exorbitant amount. Twenty million dollars, you know weh we could do with that? We could do a lot with that.”

 

Michael Augustus

“I heard twenty-three, twenty three. I heard twenty three. I heard three million more.”

 

The second sore point is the silence from the union they once led, which has yet to publicly support their fight.

 

Shane Williams

“But yet we have not heard anything from the Communication Workers Union, and we don’t know if you can get Justice without Union. You have not called them out. Is it time to call them out to, to speak up on behalf of you all and behalf of this consolidation?”

 

Emily Turner

“ Okay. So in regards to the Belize Communications Workers Union, let me say this, when we were employed at BTL, religiously, loyally, diligently a ten dollars was taken out of our salaries. We have asked them for their support, and I can say that we are disappointed because all we see is them, they are peeping through the windows and they are supposed to be doing a poll, like a survey to see if they will come out and support. I think it will be sad if we end up finishing this and they do not show up.”

 

Michael Augustus

“Emily Paul Perriott, Christine Perriott. Leanne Baldarez, myself, Dwight Gentle, we were the executive who took off, took away the same kind of BCWU that was there back in the days, where they were sleeping. They were not, they were very inactive. They were accepting under the table deals. And so we kicked them out. We took it over and we made BCWU what it is today. And so we don’t want to go back. We are not crabs.”

 

The BCWJ says permission for six days of protest was cut back to three, and police have denied their request to demonstrate tomorrow. Shane Williams for News Five.