Despite being protested against at the Ministry of the Presidency and the High Court, Government has remained steadfast in its decision not to pay severance to Wales cane harvesters, as they feel this would add to the already huge severance bill that is currently before them.
Some of the former cane cutters protesting for their severance last Thursday
Agriculture Minister Noel Holder told Guyana Times on Monday that the matter is a legal one. The minister did not buy into questions in relation to whether Government would consider paying the severance to these workers. He maintained that the Government has already taken a position.
The Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) had indicated that, during discussions with President David Granger and members of the Cabinet, they had vowed to withdraw the court matter for any guarantee that the Wales workers receive their severance.
Asked if consideration would be given to the issue on that basis, Holder reiterated that the matter is before the courts. He, however, stated that careful consideration has to be taken into account because making such a move, as it could potentially cost the Government to be placed in a bad situation.
“We have to be very careful with this; because if that is done, then every single person who has been transferred from Rose Hall to Albion and Rose Hall to Blairmont could have the same argument. and therefore the severance would be $5 billion to now $10 billion,” he told this newspaper.
Minister Holder asserted that Government would stick with the current process of having the court decide on the outcome. He recalled that prior to the closure of the Wales estate in 2016, an offer was made to the cane harvesters to work at the Uitvlugt Estate, but the workers refused.
GAWU had said that the workers were being pressured by the state-owned Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) when they are aware that the estate is located more than 20 miles away from Wales. The Union still contends that this move is contrary to the Termination of Employment and Severance Pay Act.
The workers’ argument was that it would have been uneconomical for them to travel beyond 10 miles for work, and that there was not enough harvesting at the estate to cater for the large workforce that Wales intended to send home.
Te workers are pushing for a date to be set for a court hearing. They promised to put pressure on both Government and the Court to move swiftly to have the matter involving the former cane harvesters of that estate heard as speedily as possible.
GAWU lawyer Ashton Chase had compiled and filed documents for the matter regarding the non-payment of severance packages to hundreds of sugar workers to be called up at the High Court.
Several of these former cane harvesters picketed on Thursday last, as they renewed calls for the A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) coalition Government to pay their long overdue severance immediately, as they declared that President David Granger’s Government had failed them.
This picketing exercise has added to the mounting complaints and massive denunciation the coalition Government has already received over the past few months, — since the announcement of the downsizing of the sugar industry and the firing of thousands of workers whose livelihoods depend on this key sector.
Close to 1,600 fired sugar workers who are eligible to receive $500,000 or less in severance pay have been paid in full, others would be paid 50 percent of the amounts due to them.
The Opposition People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) had put Government on blast for its decision to pay the sacked sugar workers their severance payments in two tranches. A move by Opposition Leader Bharat Jadgeo as well as others had on multiple occasions outlined it as being illegal.
According to Jadgeo, the Government knew that over 4,000 severance letters were issued even before Budget 2018 was passed, and had made no provision for severance, hence the move to approach the National Assembly recently for additional funds.
In what is described as the largest retrenchment by a private or public corporation in recent history, state owned GuySuCo, as part of its plans to restructure the sugar industry, has dismissed in excess of 4,500 sugar workers from various estates.
Even as workers at Wales fight for their severance, hundreds of sugar workers and senior persons in the sugar industry are dissatisfied with the way the GAWU had handled the sudden closure of sugar estates along with severance benefits and other issues relative to the sugar industry, and they are calling on GAWU President, Komal Chand, to resign.
The case for the Wales workers was filed by GAWU on behalf of the workers but workers have lamented that even as the court system is slow, their Union has not been pushing the issue in the public domain so as to bring about swift response.
Wales ended operations in December 2016 and some 375 workers who refused to take up employment at Uitvlugt, West Coast Demerara, remain without severance payments.
As the former employees continue to anticipate their payments, many from Wales and the surrounding communities on the West Bank of Demerara are finding much difficulty in garnering consistent employment since the closure. Many have noted the reduced earnings they have been garnering since losing their jobs one year ago.
