Dear Editor,
We are approaching another May Day, the holiday of the working people. It is a time when workers celebrate their achievements and contemplate their future.
This year, unfortunately, the toiling masses of Guyana have nothing to celebrate, and a lot of grave concerns for the future.
In just two years, the PNC-led APNU regime has done great damage to our economy. It is workers who are feeling the brunt of the pressures as a result of the regime’s faulty economic policies. Indeed, the conditions of life for workers have deteriorated drastically. What we are witnessing is an onslaught on workers.
Thousands of jobs are being lost in the private sector. Many small and medium scale enterprises are closing their doors, leaving their labour force on the breadline.
As if this were not bad enough, we see the massive attacks on the sugar workers. The sugar industry is being decimated. The Wales Estate has been closed, leaving almost two thousand works out of employment.
This is one of the direct consequences of the Government’s actions.
Thousands of sugar workers are facing a very bleak future. However, not only the workers and their families are going to suffer, but whole communities will become depressed. It will also affect the country as a whole.
This is totally unnecessary. The sugar industry does not have to close. It has the potential to add value to its product, and transform the industry from being a producer of raw sugar to a complex producing many products, such as electricity, alcohol, ethanol, refined sugar, and other special types of sugar.
That list is not exhaustive. The investments to do these things are not so great.
The Indian Government had offered assistance to re-capitalise the industry and allow it to develop into a complex. Indian companies have shown great interest in the sugar sector.
A healthy relation can be developed between GuySuCo and those companies in India, and also those in Brazil. However, the APNU regime has so far ignored the Indian interests, and has not perused the Brazilian option.
The regime is not interested in saving the industry. Instead, it seems determined to close it.
It is not accidental. This regime is anti-working people. This is not just an attack on sugar workers; no, it is an attack on the entire work force.
By attacking the most advanced, the most militant section of the work force, the regime intends to weaken the Trade Union Movement and workers as a whole. This will make the other contingent of the workers very vulnerable to future attacks by the regime.
Yet, the response from organised labour has been feeble. The disunity in the labour movement and their wrong tactics in not seeking alliances have contributed to the great damage to the working people of our country.
On this May Day, the TUC and FITUG need to do some serious soul searching if they are to become effective in defending workers and oppressed people in Guyana.
Their politics must support and defend measures that promote and defend the interests of workers, regardless of the personal political affiliations of their leaders. They must denounce the racial and political discrimination that is taking place. They must condemn the violation of human rights. They must defend the independence of the Judiciary, among other issues. Failing to do so would only see the further decimation of workers.
This May Day 2017, workers and their trade unions and other organisations must rethink their strategy and tactics. All efforts must be made for the unity of all workers.
Disunity in face of the onslaught by the regime is allowing for the reversal of the gains workers have made in recent times. This is my view. What is yours?
Sincerely,
Donald Ramotar
