BELIZE CITY, Thurs. Nov. 22, 2018– Following a meeting this morning in Belize City at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Laing Building with members of a union negotiating team which comprised the leaders of the Public Services Union (PSU), Prime Minister Dean Barrow told the media that the objectives of the meeting was to restore control of that property to the PSU, and that he has proposed a way to make that happen.
Barrow said, however, that he did not want to get into the specific details of what it is that he has proposed “because they will put out a press release later this afternoon and I don’t want to preempt them.”
Amandala has learned, however, that the plan is to approach the attorney who is representing the Chinese buyer of the Hilltop property to see if he would resell it to the PSU at a price of $400,000— the same amount that he paid to purchase it.
In addition, the PSU would have to make an upfront payment of $200,000 toward the repurchase and the PM would provide the union with a grant of $50,000 and then make an arrangement with the National Bank to lend the union the remaining $150,000.
This proposition has to be approved by the PSU membership, to whom the proposal will be put.
Barrow said that the Belmopan City Council was entitled to sell the property, but the PSU should have been notified before the property was sold.
“The sale itself took the PSU completely off guard,” Barrow noted.
