Email

Print

Those are the remarks he made in March in a discussion with at least two other union members, Lorelei Westby of the Communication Workers Union and Marvin Mora of the Energy Workers Union. Someone appears to have secretly recorded the very candid conversation. The subject is the cultural divide in the union, and in the portion of the conversation that was sent to us by a source, Neal opens up by explaining that when he came in as president, he found a very strong bias in the union towards the Stand Creek District:

Eldred Neal, President - PSU
"I move to this union and when I come and watched what Rebecca was doing, a handful of people was receiving everything. And nothing is coming, the union got nothing of it. Sister, I have AGM, and they paid for #&!* for the AGM, and everything goes to Stann Creek. You are printing material, on the union's expense and no district gets it except Stann Creek."

Eldred Neal
"I find myself eena wah stalemate now. I have a culture war in the PSU."

Lorelei Westby
"Wah what?"

Eldred Neal
"Wah Culture war. Garifuna versus *&$# everybody else. And these people will do anything to maintain power."

Eldred Neal
"Around July last year when I went to St. Vincent I spent all my night researching why the Garifuna in Belize behave how they behave. Because this is the only country they behave soh."

"I gone da south last month and the *#$! they soh fixed pon position. We deh da wah meeting di tell they that you all came to this meeting and it's unconstitutional for us to be at this meeting because we have the big meeting in Geneva, for us to be at this meeting and not nominating who will represent us on that level. We quarrel about it, the whole meeting broke up. The next day you know they come back and still didn't address it? Because it's about just they ya set of people."

Marvin Mora
"There was a law, there was a law that was enacted in Belize City that did not allow the Garifuna to be here after 6:00. So after 6:00 they #$*! had to hit the bus and haul they rass outta town!"

Eldred Neal
"You nevah hear that nowhere?"

Marvin Mora
"And the creole applauded that law. That's why they have it against we because we supported that the white people instituted for segregation. But then their revenge came about because when the education system was set up, the people from the different churches set up the thing so that the people who were educated were the Garifunas and they would educate the rest of us."

Marvin Mora
"But it's not done there. They didn't stop there. The Garifuna are greedy for power, what the "Garif" did, was, the "Garif" decided that , you know what? Every single #&!* head of department in the public service, we gwen #*!& after that. So (inaudible) they go into the..."

Eldred Neal
"(Marion Palacio, all of them)"

Marvin Mora
"PSU, they make sure they go into the #$!*BDF, they make sure they go into the police, they make sure they go into everything. So now you see the culture."

Eldred Neal
"Dat da weh we di fight back."

"Because when I done with unu, you wah know, my AGM will be interesting, because when I done wid unu."

Eldred Neal
"But people look at me and people don't know, I study these people. Face value is a whole different game."

"I talk to Jackie about the race card. You know weh she tell me, she sorry she put Marvin there."

Speaking with us just a few minutes ago, Neal rejected completely the notion that he is a bigot and said that whoever distributed the recording, quote, "did some cut and paste." Here's how he put it:

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"We received a letter from your members of the council of management, 9 members, and they are asking for you to resign. They said that you have statements you purported made to other council members and that you are in the process of conducting an exercise to purge the council of management of its Garifuna constituents."

Eldred Neal, President - PSU
"Interesting and thanks for having me today Jules. In fact I received that letter on Friday and I was made aware of this situation over a month ago. In no way have I had any issue trying to purge the council of any race of individuals. Mind you the behavior of some persons at the table had brought a number of issues to question."

Jules Vasquez, 7News
"So now will you resign?"

Eldred Neal, President - PSU
"Of course not. I was elected by a constituent that reflects over 3,000 employees. If I'm supposed to look at the entire public service representative, that constituent housed over 12,000 employees. 9 individuals being misled by a recording or text of any form to suggest that I am against a specific group of people in the union is totally wrong, it's fraudulent and it needs to be called out. And if you hear a conversation, again, not in its entirety, as to suggest that I am saying only branches are receiving anything, am I lying?"

"PSU have embarked on a loan through the public sector workers trust. I took presidency. If 50 loans were distributed, 40 went to Dangriga. Am I not supposed to say we're not going to render any more loans until we bring parity across the entire country and quote me on this, this is the reality and I had to say. We have to bring some sort of parity to the union. It can't be such an open imbalance."

Because we did the interview literally at 6:30, that is only a small portion of the interview, and we'll have the rest of it in tomorrow's news.

As for his part in it, Marvin Mora told us, quote, "Whatever you heard in there was taken out of context - it was a conversation - about the whole issue of division not only in Belize but in the Caribbean and worldwide." When asked specifically about his statement that, quote, "The Garifuna are greedy for power," he said, quote, "I don't recall making that statement." He said that whoever secretly recorded the conversation did something low and uncalled for.

In the signed letter to President Eldred Neal, the council of management members say, quote, "We regard these matters as extremely serious and deeply disconcerting. You are aware that many of our Garifuna brothers and sisters voted in your favor at the time of your election to the presidency of the Public Services Union. You will therefore understand the deep sense of betrayal that is felt as a result of your statements and actions. The last thing that we would expect is that a leader of the Public Service Union would fan the flames of racial discord and intolerance." End quote.