We Are the People’s United Party

This Sunday the National Party Council (NPC) of the People’s United Party will meet to discuss several important issues pertaining to the party and the country. The NPC is the second highest governing body of the PUP with representation from all thirty-one constituencies.

The NPC meets every three months. As a body they are responsible for directing policy, organizing, administration and providing discipline for the party. The NPC has the power to do all that’s necessary for the enforcement of the Party’s Constitution, including the achievement of the aims and objects of the party. The National Party Council is subject only to the supreme authority, which is the National Convention.

Last year the party held a series of consultations which revealed that some of the biggest concerns of our party faithful was the feeling that the Party had strayed away from its philosophical moorings of service to the people, fighting for the marginalized and more so for the poor. One of the greatest challenges for the new leadership therefore is to bring the Party back to its original principles so that supporters can see us as the party for the people.

All of us in the PUP recognize that our movement began as a labor movement and that more importance needs to be given to our Belizean workers. That is why we will affirm that while we will protect the right “to the ownership of private property,” our party will also “prohibit the exploitation of man by man or by the state.” Likewise we believe that we must “protect the rights of workers to organize, unionize and strike.”

We also believe “that there should be adequate means of livelihood for all, that labor should not be exploited or forced by economic necessity to operate in inhumane conditions but that there should be opportunity for advancement on the basis of recognition of merit, ability and integrity; that equal protection should be given to all children regardless of their social status and that a just system should be ensured to provide for the education and health on the basis of equality”.

In our Aims and Objects, our party will also be making some fundamental changes. We believe that we are blessed with natural resources and should not have the high levels of poverty that we are currently suffering and that our people are our most significant resource. A recent report about the state of poverty shows that poverty has increased since 2003 from 33 percent to 42 percent in 2009. This is unacceptable and our party will be proposing on Sunday that our ultimate goal as PUP will be the elimination of poverty and the creation of a more just and equal Belize.

In the Aims and Objects of the PUP, we propose to “achieve full economic independence by perusing a national Policy that stimulates higher economic productivity and development and foster Self Reliance and Full Employment.”

As a Party we will “ensure that every Belizean has equal access to Quality, Relevant, and Practical Education from pre-school to university with a special emphasis on Universal Secondary School enrolment and completion” and we will also aspire “that all Belizeans have equal access to Quality and Universal Health Care.”

While I realize that some may think that these goals are impossible to achieve, I am optimistic, because the People’s United Party is a party of visionaries. In the 1950’s when George Price talked about an Independent Belize, many thought his was an impossible dream, yet Mr. Price never gave up and after 31 years of hard work Belize gained its independence.

Today Belize is calling on the People’s United Party once again, to dream big and realize these dreams. We can do it again and if will be done if we are a UNITED party. Let’s join hands and heart and continue this progressive revolution.

| | | | | |