A month before closure: Govt still awaiting arrival of ITEL management team

With only one month remaining before ITEL Guyana ceases its local operations, the Government of Guyana is still awaiting the arrival of the business process outsourcing (BPO) company’s management team, which is currently overseas.
About a week ago, ITEL had announced that, after much thought, it would cease operating in Guyana by November 30, and the official shutdown of its Georgetown office has been slated for December 31, 2024. The result of this closure would result in more than 400 workers losing their jobs, and the financial support system ceasing to be.
In a telephone discussion with this publication on Wednesday, Labour Minister Joseph Hamilton revealed that the ITEL management team had not indicated exactly when it would arrive in Guyana, but
the principals have been engaged through virtual mediums and they are aware of what is required of them.
“We are waiting on the principals. As I understand it from the local management here, they are there to come into Guyana. We have (had) preliminary conversations with them (local management here), so when the principals of the company come, then we’ll have the discussions with them. That is (the position taken by) the Chief Legal Officer (of the company). We have requested from them the information regarding the persons: how many persons, the names of the persons, their salaries, and what are their likely benefits,” he detailed.
“Of course, we have to give them some time, because that was just last week; but they didn’t give a definitive time when the principals of the company will be in Guyana,” Hamilton disclosed.
In addition to ensuring that the affected workers at the call centre are properly compensated, Hamilton said, Government would assist in finding alternative employment or training opportunities for them.
Minister Hamilton explained that the data to be provided by the ITEL company would play a vital role is helping Government to identify suitable jobs for each individual.
“We’ll be in a better position when we have the data. Right now, I (wouldn’t) have the Ministry of Labour advise Government (in this regard); we are not in a position to do that. We heard that it’s about 400 persons, but we don’t know; we have to validate that via documentation. Secondly, we have to know how long people were working, and that would determine their termination benefits. And so some people might be in a better position than others,” he added.
ITEL Guyana opened its doors over three years ago with plans to expand the country’s telecommunication and services sector. The company has since indicated that its closure is resulting from its inability to operate in Guyana amid the country’s unprecedented economic growth.
Head of the Guyana Office for Investment, Its Chief Investment Officer Dr Peter Ramsaroop, has assured that the sector’s overall health remains robust, so much so that the Government is even focusing on a shift from traditional call centre services to more sophisticated back-office processing operations.
Ramsaroop, whose remarks were issued days after the ITEL announcement, has noted that this transition aligns with Government’s strategy to move towards higher-value services that demand more specialised skills.
In August this year, it was announced that $2 billion had been injected in the local BPO sector as the Guyana Government aims to create 15,000 jobs in that sector by the end of next year.
The Guyana Office for Investment (Go-Invest) has said that President Irfaan Ali’s commitment to advancing the BPO sector began to take shape with the implementation of fiscal incentives and various forms of support, such as skills development in the labour force. According to Go-Invest, the $2 billion was invested into constructing readymade call centre shells, strategically located across the country in such places as Region Two, Region Five, Region Six, Tuschen, Enmore and Linden. This infrastructural development has been complemented by training programmes for new recruits and by enhancing ICT literacy.