Wales workers are entitled to their due severance

Dear Editor,
My attention was drawn to a Guyana Times article of February 7, 2018, captioned “GuySuCo snubs Wales cane cutters – says workers not entitled to severance pay”. The article stated, inter alia, that approximately 400 cane cutters who were attached to the now closed Wales Estate may never receive a severance according to the acting CEO, Paul Bhim.
The CEO declared that they are not entitled since they are at “risk of self-termination because of their refusal to take up the offer” of working at Uitvlugt Estate. I gather the CEO meant the workers would have voluntarily terminated their services. Further, the CEO “argued” that his position is being supported by the collective labour agreement that exists between GuySuCo and the sugar union –the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU).
The CEO stated that 120 Wales’ cane cutters have taken up the offer to work at Uitvlugt Estate in similar capacity. It would appear that since these workers have taken up the company’s offer, the others were, and are, obligated to do likewise, and their refusal therefore constitute the voluntary termination of their service.
I would think the company would have been properly edified on the provisions of the Termination of Employment and Severance Pay Act (TESPA) that states under Section 21, clause 4 (b) that the payment of a severance will not apply where the employee “unreasonably refuses in case of redundancy to accept an offer of re-employment by the employer at the same place of employment or within a radius of 10 miles therefrom under no less favourable condition than those such employee enjoyed immediately prior to the termination”.
Editor, even if the collective agreement makes provision for the transfer of employees within estates, such transfers were in the context that the estates were all operating estates. In the case at point, Wales is closed. The extant law, therefore, supersedes the provisions in the agreement, because workers’ jobs at Wales have been made redundant.
There are a few fundamental points in the aforementioned clause of the TESPA. First it speaks of “re-employment” and “immediately prior to the termination”, which clearly means that the service of the employee has to be terminated and then be re-employed, if re-employment meets the full requirements of this clause. It is obvious therefore that a severance allowance will have to be paid for the services at the point of termination, before re-employment takes its course.
Secondly, re-employment must be within a radius of 10 miles therefrom (therefrom means the original place of employment). Uitvlugt is reportedly 20 miles away from Wales Estate (the original place of employment). The law, therefore, protects the 400-odd workers from being compelled to work at Uitvlugt Estate. Their refusal, therefore, cannot be considered that they have voluntarily terminated their service. It matters not if sufficient amount of productive work is available at Uitvlugt. It is for the company to convince the workers, in all forms and inducements, to accept the offer to work at Uitvlugt. It cannot impose upon them to work at Uitvlugt.
In all fairness and in sincere application of the law, the 400 workers at Wales are entitled to their due severance. The sugar company should not, and cannot, deny these workers on the absurd claim that their refusal to work at Uitvlugt means that they have voluntarily terminated their service.

Yours faithfully,
Selwyn Narinedatt