By Belize Live News Staff: Conventional wisdom says you cancel the protest once you win. The NTUCB has apparently never met conventional wisdom.
The National Trade Union Congress of Belize has confirmed that Tuesday’s demonstration is still on, full schedule, two venues: the Sir Edney Cain Building in Belmopan and BTL headquarters in Belize City, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Any venue change, they say, comes over the weekend.
Remember the original script. The Belmopan demonstration was timed to the Cabinet meeting where ministers were supposed to decide the Speednet deal’s fate, the unions outside while the decision happened inside. Then Cabinet tore up the script on Wednesday, announcing it does not support the acquisition and killing the takeover before a single placard was lifted.
Most observers assumed that was that. The unions are saying not quite.
The announcement doesn’t spell out why the march proceeds, and that’s the delicious question hanging over Tuesday. Is it a victory lap, thousands in the streets to celebrate what pressure accomplished? Is it insurance, a reminder that the country is watching in case the deal tries to rise from the dead? Or is there a longer list of grievances that Speednet merely headlined? The addition of BTL headquarters as a venue hints the unions have words for the company itself, not just the Cabinet that owns most of it.
Tuesday will tell. What’s already told is the lesson of the past two weeks: organized labour flexed, the public wore its black, and the biggest deal in the country died before the demonstration it feared. Whatever Tuesday’s marchers chant, they arrive as the side that moved a government without leaving the starting line.
10 a.m. to 1 p.m., Belmopan and Belize City. Bring water, the forecast says August.
So tell us, Belize: will you be out on Tuesday, and what should the unions’ message be now that the deal is dead? Let us know in the comments.
