Dear Editor,
The Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) finds it necessary to bring clarity to several assertions made by Prime Minister (PM) Moses Nagamootoo in his column titled “Sugar and Politricks” which was published on January 14, 2018.
Having read the PM’s column, from all appearances it seems Nagamootoo did not heed our sincere advice to have his columns fact-checked before they are sent to press in order to avoid any embarrassment to him or his office. If it is indeed that his columns are benefiting from such an examination, it seems that the job was not thoroughly done.
PM Nagamootoo says his Government has nothing to gain from any sugar worker being laid off. But while the PM writes with great concern, we see his statements translated into hardly any action. If we go by the situation that is playing out at Wales, for instance, the PM’s words offer little, if any, comfort to the hundreds who have been sent home and facing a miserable and difficulty-filled life.
The PM then goes and attempts to twist the truth regarding GAWU’s court action with respect to the Wales workers. Nagamootoo, like a hoarse singer, belting out the same tune over and over, seeks ashamedly to find sordid cover for denial of severance pay to the approximately 100 workers of Wales for several months. This now very much overused red-herring has lost its luster and our Union has, on several occasions, corrected the PM’s misguided innuendos. But just to clear the air of misinformation, our Union’s approach to the Courts became necessary after the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) refused to abide by the Termination of Employment and Severance Pay Act (TESPA) regarding its decision to make workers of Wales redundant. The court approved our request on May 9, 2017, though the concerned workers severance was due on April 23, 2017. As the dates attest, our court action was not in the way of paying the workers their due payments, but the PM unashamedly seeks to use it as a mask for the GuySuCo’s – and possibly the Government’s – decision to punish the workers.
Nagamootoo then writes saying our Union is demanding that the workers be paid their severance payments now. It seems, from our perspective, that the PM may need to have his eyes checked, as that has always been our demand. Then the PM says that “[n]either the Termination of Employment and Severance Pay Act (TESPA), nor the collective labour agreement stipulates a date by which such payments ought to be made…”. We wish to point the PM, to Section 21(1) of TESPA. We believe it may be edifying for him.
The PM goes on writing that $500 million was budgeted for severance. This is strange, as the PM’s Cabinet and AFC colleague, Agriculture Minister Noel Holder, after our Union publicly disclosed that GuySuCo hadn’t the monies to meet the workers severance payment.
The PM says some 500 workers were engaged in certain re-training. But just mere days prior to Nagamootoo’s column, he read a message in the National Assembly from President David Granger which said in reference to re-training that “…over 100 of them [workers] signalling their willingness to be retrained”. Tisk tisk PM Nagamootoo, do you see how important fact checking is. These foot in the mouth episodes could be avoided.
Mr Nagamootoo then serenades us about recent training done by the Business Ministry or small business loans. If the PM’s figures are correct, given the obvious inaccuracies contained in his column, we must ask: how many sugar workers benefited? The PM also touts investments that his Government supposedly garnered, we ask again: how many sugar workers were employed as we see the cement factory along the Berbice River which Vice President, Khemraj Ramjattan said would have been a major employer of displaced sugar workers closed and some 100 employees sent into the unemployed world.
We recognise the PM is trying tirelessly to free himself and Government from the sad situation that grips thousands in the sugar belt. While the PM speaks about Politricks, it is the Administration of which he is a top member that is engaged in trickery, deception and duplicity. How else can Nagamootoo move from saying to GINA on November 28, 2015 that “There should be no discussion or debate regarding the importance of the sugar industry to Guyana’s economy… in fact we have said this on a number of occasions, that this Government sees sugar as too big to fail” to now supporting openly and blaringly decisions to close down estates and put people out of work and into a life of impoverishment.
Yours faithfully,
Seepaul Narine
General Secretary,
GAWU
