GAWU Combat - Nov-Dec 2018

Issue#6 Volume#39

Combat Voice of the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU)

Editorial

A Century of Trade Unionism 2019 will commence with Guyana, and more so the working-class, observing the 100th Anniversary of Trade Unionism in Guyana. Indeed, it is a proud achievement, especially taking into account that the establishment of the British Guiana Labour Union (BGLU), now the Guyana Labour Union (GLU), on January 11, 1919, marked the first time that an organization to advocate on behalf of workers had been established outside of our colonial master – Great Britain.

This was a most remarkable achievement, bearing in mind that the ruler class controlled almost every facet of life at that time of colonial domination.

Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow, the Father of Trade Unionism, was dedicated and determined to bring an end to the horrific conditions that the working-classes were forced to endure. In the early 1900s, both working and living conditions for all categories of workers were horrendous. Workers were faced with a long working day for low remuneration in the face of the rising cost of living. An examination of the economic circumstances of British Guiana in the early 20th century reveals not simply high taxes, declining wages and unemployment, but also a rapid increase in the cost of living and a monocrop economy in recession. The unemployment and underemployment that characterised the colony were exacerbated by the high direct and indirect taxes that were imposed on the poorest segments of the population.

It was within this context of rapidly decaying economic and social circumstances that trade unionism in British Guiana was born. The immediate origins of the trade union movement can be traced to a strike by waterfront workers for increased wages in November and December 1905 in Georgetown, which was led by Critchlow. It was Critchlow’s participation and role in this strike that gave him credibility as a workers’ leader.

The failure of this 1905 strike demonstrated that there was a pressing need for a trade union in the colony. The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 heightened the need for a trade union in the colony, since the working classes were confronted with continuous increases in the cost of living and deterioration in the social and economic conditions.

With the support of the workers in the colony, who came from various occupations and worked in a number of industries, and assistance from trade unions in Britain, Critchlow established the BGLU. The Union quickly established itself as an important player in the colony. One of the most significant achievements of the BGLU under Critchlow, however, was the acquisition of legal recognition for trade unions in June 1921.

As we celebrate this special achievement, it is disconcerting for us to record that the times of Critchlow and our contemporary situation share striking similarities.

In recent times, the working-people have been facing increasing pressures and burdens.

Continued on page two (2) COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

17 November - 31 December, 2018

Sugar production target surpassed - workers bonus unrealistic

As at December 31, 2018, sugar production for the year reached 104,629 tonnes sugar as follows:-

have received such disdainful treatment.

Workers staged picketing exercises and protest actions to demand that they benefit from Estate First Crop Second Crop Year increased pay. Undoubtedly, their loud Target Actual Target Actual Target Actual calls could not be ignored by the CorpoAlbion 19,698 18,232 37,031 39,253 56,729 57,485 ration and the Government. As a result, Blairmont 9,736 9,122 19,091 20,123 28,827 29,245 the GuySuCo proposed paying what it Uitvlugt 6,671 7,098 10,775 10,801 17,446 17,899 deemed a bonus payment based on sugar production.

Total 36,105 34,452 66,897 70,177 103,002 104,629 The payment is identical to the Annual Production Incentive (API) arrangeWhile the Corporation, for the first time since 2015, ments which go back prior to our country attaining inhas exceeded its production target, a laudable achieve- dependence. It is a benefit which has been suspended for ment, we recognize too that the annual production tar- the last few years though there really wasn’t any credible get, 103,002 tonnes, was lower than the 115,447 tonnes rationale for such suspension. Through the arrangesugar Finance Minister Winston Jordan has said the in- ment, workers received 1½ days’ pay for the production dustry would realise in his 2018 Budget address. We do of 98,000 tonnes sugar and ½ day’s pay for every 1,500 not recall any explanation being given for the produc- tonnes sugar or part thereof produced subsequently. tion target reduction.

Based on sugar production this year, workers would The exceeding of the production target, in GAWU’s benefit from 3.7 days’ pay. The Corporation informed view, cannot be disconnected from the hard work and that given its financial situation, the payment to the dedicated efforts of the thousands of sugar workers. This workers would be made at the end of January or early fact, we noted too, was also recognized by the Corpo- February, 2019. ration, with the November 30, Stabroek News quoting Without a doubt, given the efforts and the committhe Corporation’s Corporate Communications Manag- ment of the workers in 2018, a fact acknowledged by the er, Audreyanna Thomas as saying “…commitment shown Corporation in its public statements, the bonus payment by the management and staff on the Estates is commend- cannot be deemed as unrealistic. While the GAWU had able”. proposed the Corporation to consider a more suitable The Corporation’s achievement comes at a time when proposal, it pointed to its financial position, and did not workers in the sugar industry have been denied a raise agree to further adjustments. While the bonus is welin pay for over 1,500 days or over 4½ years now. It is comed by the workers, they remain peeved that wages the longest period that sugar workers have essentially still remain unaddressed. The Corporation, has comhad their wages frozen since the sugar industry became mitted to continue to examine our request for a 15 per state-owned in 1976. In recent weeks, workers have been cent pay rise for 2018. pressing to receive a pay rise, recognizing that they re- Continued on page two (2) main the only group of workers in the State sector to PAGE ONE

A Century of Trade Unionism Continued from page one (1) The promise of a ‘Good Life’ has given way to increased unemployment, taxation of essential items, new and increased taxes, heightened fees for state services, and other measures that are serving to heighten the cost-of-living. Alongside those developments, we continue to witness economic decline and the associated challenges which are spawned by such troubling developments.

In sugar, we see the well-being of thousands made jobless through estate closure.

We are also hearing from the business organisations that commercial activity is contracting and affecting employment. A similar trend is also observed in rice as well. And despite the fanfare, the oil and gas sector and its expected windfall re-

mains on the distant horizon and shrouded in much uncertainty.

In the face of severe economic pressures and multi-faceted difficulties, we are seeing rising militancy and fightback to the harsh conditions that are today’s realities.

This is indeed an encouraging development and one which augurs well for our people. We stand solidly with those organisations and movements who are struggling to ease the burdens and bring about positive changes to the people’s well-being.

As we celebrate during 2019 – A Century of Trade Unionism – it is important that we take account of the advances we have made since the time of Nathaniel Critchlow and keep before us also the challenges which still lie in our path.

30 participants conclude 2nd UNIFOR/GAWU course

Participants who attended the course pose for a group photo

On November 30, 2018, thirty (30) participants drawn from Albion, Blairmont and Uitvlugt estates completed training through the UNIFOR/GAWU-organized educational project. The 5-day course, which began on November 26 and concluded on November 30 saw participants expressing several positive views about the training. During an evaluation session, they shared they genuinely learnt a lot, and some of what they were taught they were hearing it for the first time.

They also complimented the GAWU and expressed their appreciation to UNIFOR for its timely support.

The project, being funded by UNIFOR’s Social Justice Fund (SJF), was launched last September, and seeks to educate participants about the changing circumstances of the sugar industry locally, regionally and internationally. Apart from such sessions, participants also benefitted from sessions regarding communication skills, the Collective Labour Agreement, COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

the role of a shop steward, and the history and structure of GAWU. They also received several presentations from external agencies such as the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA), the National Insurance Scheme (NIS), the Ministry of Social Protection, the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo), and the European Union (EU) delegation in Guyana.

The GAWU is strongly of the view that, through education, union members would be enabled to best represent and advance their interests. Our commitment to educating our members is manifested in the GAWU Labour College which provides adequate facilities to pursue the Union’s educational work and programme. The GAWU, in recent times, has also been organizing workshops and seminars in several areas as it seeks to better educate and inform workers about important matters and topics of concern to them generally, but more particularly their working-life.

Oil and the Society The announcement by ExxonMobil recently that it has made an amazing 10th oil discovery was news that has become all too regular now-a-days. The latest discovery, Exxon advises, put Guyana as having some 5 billion barrels of oil.

On a per-captia basis, each man, woman and child, at this time has 6,738 barrels of oil to their credit.

At US$50 per barrel, it means that each citizen has oil to the value of $70.7M to their name. For many, that sum is more than they and their family will probably earn or own in their entire lifetime and it demonstrates the vast wealth that could very well be unlocked by oil production.

Undoubtedly it is in recognition of such realities that many persons have expressed serious concerns regarding the arrangements concerning commercial oil production, which incidentally is just months away. Several justifiable criticisms have been placed squarely at the feet of Government, recognizing the glaringly lopsided contract negotiated with Exxon and its partners. The lack of any particular safeguards and guarantees especially as it relates to local content has evoked a great deal of concern too. Moreover, the management of the sums that will come our way is another matter that has evoked debate as well. In totality, the Government’s handling of the oil sector, our people’s patrimony, has attracted focused attention and dismay.

For its part, the Administration has sought as best as it could to sidestep the criticisms and have sought to divert Guyanese attention by the promises of unprecedented wealth. Citizens have heard from Government officials and lackeys that the country could become the wealthiest in the region. The recent 2019

Budget referred to the benefits accruing from oil though being strangely silent on the consequences and repercussions.

Renowned commentator Christopher Ram, in his Stabroek News column not too long ago, estimated that oil revenue by the mid-2020s could be in the vicinity of a few billion United States dollars per year. Indeed, this is a significant sum, especially when one considers the size of the economy is just around US$4B currently.

While the oil revenues, being dangled like a carrot on a stick, could very well make a big difference in the lives of Guyanese, it could also very well bring a fair share of new challenges. One such difficulty that could arise may be with regards to the impact on traditional Guyanese values and norms. Indeed, despite our challenges, our people’s values have largely remained the same since colonial times, though there have been changes, some subtle and others not so subtle. As a people, we carry ourselves with certain imbued traditions.

With oil becoming a major factor, the influx of foreigners, who come with their own value systems, will pose some challenges. While that may not, at least initially, be a major factor, the spending and activities around the oil sector, the desire to live a certain lifestyle, and the substantial cash that could be available could very well serve to influence our people in several ways. What should not be ignored too is the poles that will be between the oil and non-oil participants in our country could also influence social change given the disparities in income that is anticipated.

Whatever is the case, oil will make an impact, both good and bad.

Sugar production target surpassed

Continued from page one (1) The Union, in the new year, will continue to press the Corporation recognizing that in 2019, workers will be enjoying rates-of-pay that were fixed in 2014. The bonus is a one-off payment and will not be added to workers’ pay. In effect, it is just a little hand out.

The sugar workers undeniably have put

in their lot, but for those efforts they are faced with denial of their due reward as their wages have fallen by as much as $284,000 on average since 2014. They probably remain the only group of the nation’s workers to find themselves in such a depressing situation. Indeed, the Government and GuySuCo should really seek to remove this ignominious stain from their record.

“Capitalist barbarism, crisis and Imperialist wars,

or socialism” PAGE TWO

Budget 2019 will not alleviate the burdens of our working-people - FITUG The Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Guyana (FITUG) has considered fully and carefully the 2019 National Budget presented by Minister of Finance Winston Jordan on November 26. The Federation takes this opportunity to complement the Minister on the largest ever Budget and the longest ever Budget presentation. But, for us, those are the only remarkable features of Budget 2019.

From the workers’ point-of-view, there is nearly nothing that the workers could point out to say what this ‘the biggest budget in Guyana’s history’ will do to lessen the heavy burdens that have been placed on their backs. Indeed, taking into account the substantial jump in tax revenues, it appears to us that the clutches of taxation will tighten even more in 2019. At the same time, the stifling costof-living remains unchecked and will more than eat away at the crumbs that have been thrown to the workers. The Federation has seen the Government going on a propaganda offensive as it seeks to convince Guyanese that Budget has their interests at heart. For instance, the Department of Public Information says the Budget introduces no new taxes, but really there is hardly anything left to tax apart from the air we breathe. Clearly, the Budget illustrates how much disconnected is the Government from the ordinary people.

The FITUG is most peeved to recognise that none of the rational suggestions it advanced during the Budget consultation process was apparently were taken on board. We wonder yet again whether these engagements were serious, as they should be, or is the Administration going through a ritual for public consumption.

While we hope that the former is the case, serious credence is given to whether the latter is really the reality. Certainly, questions about the unaffordability of what we proposed seem moot, recognising that budgeted expenditure has risen

by 12.5 since the 2018 Budget. Quite obviously, monies are available but the lack of emphasis about the concerns of our people sticks out like a sore thumb.

The Budget, it seemed to us, is largely a rehash of what we saw before and, it appears that the Government is numb to the realities facing the Guyanese people. The FITUG had high expectations to learn about policies aimed at re-building our foreign reserves; reducing the Government’s Bank of Guyana overdraft; reduce inefficient and extravagant expenditure; improve our communities; meaningfully address the growing unemployment; really assist our elderly and vulnerable who are being crushed by the realities of life in Guyana, and to confront the spiraling criminality in our midst. Disappointingly and disturbingly, there seems to be no real serious concern about these matters, and the ‘tax, borrow and spend mentality’ is rigidly held on to though the shortcomings of that approach are visible for even the blind to see.

Given the absence of really anything for the ordinary man, woman and child, the FITUG is perplexed to know where the large sum budgeted will really go. It seems to us that a significant sum will be gobbled up by the bloated State bureaucracy; no doubt millions, if not billions, will be used to jet off to all corners of Guyana and the exotic locales of our globe, and quite possibly an obscene sum will be channelled to pay the super-salaries and superior perks of our nation’s large pool of Ministers. While monies are going in this direction, a lot of people have really serious troubles to put meals on their tables; to send their children to school; to pay their bills; to have adequate shelter, among other things.

For the FITUG, Budget 2019 is a great disappointment filled with hollow rhetoric. It is clear that the promise of a ‘Good Life’ has lost all its lustre and meaning.

GAWU/DHBC reach agreement on improvements - union presses for Job Evaluation to conclude Negotiations between the Demerara Harbour Bridge Corporation (DHBC) and the GAWU have seen workers benefitting from several improvements.

Through the agreement, workers earning less than $100,000 a month will receive a seven per cent increase, and those earning between $100,000 and $299,999 will get an increase of 6.5 per cent, in keeping with the salary levels of public servants.

COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

The Corporation also approved higher meals allowances and a year-end bonus of $20,000 to each employee, representing a higher bonus than last year. The Union has urged the DHBC to have the job evaluation, which started over a year ago, concluded. The Corporation agreed to seek Human Resources Consultant’s support to have the final aspect of the exercise that is the determination of the bands completed.

GAWU calls on Government to accept No Confidence verdict - looks to GECOM to deliver a credible election

The GAWU, in its 2018 end of year press statement, called on the APNU+AFC Government to accept the results of the No Confidence motion which was approved by the National Assembly on December 21, 2018. In the statement, the Union said:“A major topic of discussion at this time concerns the motion of No Confidence which was approved by the National Assembly on December 21. While we noted pronouncements by His Excellency President David Granger, among other Governmental officials, that National and Regional Elections would be held in keeping with the Constitutional requirements, we see too some persons offering differing views. The GAWU has seen from news reports that the Administration is considering actively a Court challenge regarding the No Confidence motion despite its utterances.

The successful passage of a No Confi-

dence motion was yet another manifestation of our nation’s cherished democratic culture and values. The GAWU is aware that the democracy we rightly take pride in was not given freely, but was won, by, among others, the struggles of the Guyanese working-class. The possible attempts as we see now playing out to undermine our democratic credentials cannot be seen in a positive light. The GAWU urges that the verdict of the motion be accepted and the resultant measures be put in place. Our Union also, at this time, looks to the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) to put in place adequate systems to safeguard and ensure that the Official List of Electors (OLE) is properly reflective, that the Guyanese people’s franchise is properly recorded, and that our elections are deemed free and fair and also free from fear. Indeed, this undoubtedly is the wish of Guyanese people at this time.”

NHSL employees receive year-end bonus

- expansion project affected by US certification Discussions between the Union and the Noble House Seafoods Limited (NHSL) about a year-end bonus successfully concluded. A year-end bonus averaging $30,000 per employee had been received with joy.

The fishing industry, in recent times, has been experiencing some difficulties following demands for producers to obtain new certification to export to the United States of America (USA). The demands to obtain certification, among other things, forced one major processor – BEV Processors Inc – to shut its

operations.

NHSL in the meantime is working to secure the necessary certification to allow for its products to have market access to the USA and, at the same time, is working on an expansion project. The Company has purchased the processing equipment from the shuttered BEV and had plans to employ some of the former BEV employees. The expansion works, however, have been affected by certification process.

PAGE THREE

Prime Minister now reduced to a toothless poodle The December 10, Stabroek News reported that Prime Minister and First Vice President Moses Nagamootoo, in his contribution to the 2019 Budget debate, said the Budget “…will ensure pay and continued jobs for all workers inside and outside of government…”. While the Prime Minister boasts about jobs that the Budget will provide in his speech on the 2019 Budget in the National Assembly, he carefully and clearly avoided any reference to the serious situation playing out in the sugar belt. As is known, on one hand his Government, with a few at the top sitting in some air conditioned room with the fancifulness of life, has decided to put thousands of workers out of jobs, and on the other, has denied purposeful or otherwise, those still connected to the industry a pay raise since his Government took office. It’s hard to believe that the Prime Minister forgot about the sugar workers and the affection he says he has for them, as he seldom misses the opportunity to boast about his ties with the sugar workers and their struggles.

Today, as Christmas 2018 approaches, the Prime Minister is now ensconced in the bosom of Government and political power, though it is contended by some that he has none, enjoying the perks and privilege it brings. Today, obviously he has forgotten much of what he proclaimed he stood for. Just eight (8) years ago, incidentally in the Christmas Season, the now Prime Minister called on Guyanese to “Light a Candle” for Sugar Workers, a phrase he said he borrowed from Rickey Singh whom he reportedly had removed as a columnist with the Chronicle not long after he assumed his high position.

At that time, the now Prime Minister said, “[t]he Government would do well also to explore all possibilities to give the sugar workers even a nominal wage increase.

Zero is an insult, not an option”.

But now with Mr Nagamootoo in the driver’s seat, under his watch, it has been zero in 2015, zero in 2016, zero in 2017, and so far, zero in 2018. It is an insult to the hard-working workers that Mr Nagamootoo and company has now made zero not an option, but a shameful feature.

Mr Nagamootoo, in his now infamous 2010 missive, also said, “…workers were literally expected to ‘produce or perish’”.

Now, under Mr Nagamootoo’s Government, it is sad to say that workers are producing and yet perishing. The December 13, Stabroek News reported that the Corporation said “…it is poised to achieve its COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

production target for the year, 2018 of 103, 000 tonnes of sugar…”. The article went on to report “[t]he Corporation said it would like to thank all employees for remaining focused on the task at hand and delivering a successful target”. Though making such efforts and laudable contributions, they are taking home less pay than they did prior to the Coalition taking office. It is instructive to recall that the Prime Minister, in the November 08, 2011 Kaieteur News, is quoted as saying “sugar workers were being screwed”. As we consider past

will do the very same thing? Glaringly it demonstrates that this agony, Mr Nagamootoo said the Government endured was just playing to the crowd, as his Government’s actions are vastly different.

But in seeking to give credence to the Government’s position, Mr Nagamootoo, unashamedly, said “[i]t had become unsustainable to operate the sugar industry without bringing the entire economy down!”. Though several persons as well as GAWU, have pointed out such statements belong in a world of fiction, the erstwhile

Sugar workers picketing the Parliament on December 05, 2018

utterances with today’s actions, we are reminded that Bob Marley, famously and correctly said, “Who the cap fit, let them wear it”.

Regarding the minimization of sugar, the Prime Minister reportedly said, according to DPI, that the Cabinet spent “days, weeks and months agonizing on how to deal with the tragedy of the sugar industry”. He also says the Government’s “interest was to save it”. Mr Nagamootoo in his 2012 Budget debate contribution, said on the sugar industry “…I crave your indulgence very quickly, there is no easy fix. The time for a new governance mechanism is now, not tomorrow, not in the future, not in the next 5 years. It must not depend on whether we discover oil or harness hydro-energy.” Indeed, what has happened to those lofty demands? Is it a case of the Prime Minister putting on a stage show in the National Assembly in 2012?

If indeed the Government was sincerely interested in saving the industry, it begs the question, why didn’t they? Certainly, the industry was not beyond the point of redemption. The Sugar CoI, which the Prime Minister referred to in his contribution, pointed the way to safeguard and make sugar viable. Some of those very suggestions were reiterated when GAWU provided its submission to the Government on February 17, last year.

So far, the Administration has never said our suggestions were not viable. But then again how could they when they say they

ally of the sugar workers continues to repeat it. As renowned Guyanese reggae artist Natural Black poignantly said, it is clear the Prime Minister and cohorts, are “Far from reality”. The fact remains, the state support to the sugar industry represented just 3 per cent of the Administration’s aggregate expenditure that is hardly sufficient to create the conditions for economic collapse. On that note, if Mr Nagamootoo, is so concerned about an economic collapse – as he should be – he should look at the sliding levels of foreign reserves; the mounting Central Government overdraft at the Bank of Guyana; the high budget deficits and the borrowing associated with filling those holes; the state of play in our economic sectors; increasing unemployment and lower consumption are just but a few of the ugly features of our times he should pay attention to. Those matters, among others, are telltale signs that could snowball into an avalanche to bring the economy down.

Our Union was indeed surprised to see the Prime Minister, as he pledged subservience, said “…a feasibility study done in 2000 concerning the sugar industry which showed that the ‘estate should be concentrated in the East Berbice where it is better suited for cane cultivation’”. While a LMC study around that period had recommended such an approach, the then Government disagreed and with GuySuCo presented a plan, which was accepted

by the World Bank and the other international financial institutions, to retain the Demerara Estates. Undoubtedly, part of that plan led to the construction of the Enmore packaging plant; the conversion of land for mechanization, the studies for the construction of co-generation plants, among other things. We should add that had the international institutions not found the plan feasible, their support to the Skeldon project would have been withheld. For us it is disingenuous for the Prime Minister to make reference to a now 18-year-old study without speaking about what transpired in the aftermath.

But we also found it ironic that the Prime Minister who is now espousing that the East Berbice Estates should have been retained, participated actively in the decisions which saw the closure of two (2) estates in that region. We also found it strange that prior to now, the Prime Minister had not mentioned this study.

Certainly, he was aware of it when he was serenading sugar workers with melodious promises of 20 per cent increase; no closure of estates and so on as he sought to win their support. It certainly demonstrates, once again, this so-called ‘friend of the sugar workers’ was speaking with a forked tongue and was clearly aimed at vote-getting at all costs and consequence.

The Prime Minister, in his address, said “…alternatives were made available for the retrenched workers, and government was prepared to pay workers their severance but… [the] Guyana Agriculture Workers’ Union who stopped the process from going forward”. It seems Mr Nagamootoo was imagining things or is prepared to sell untruths as if they were the gospel.

Whatever the case is, the Prime Minister is again “far from reality” and it seems he doesn’t think out his statements before making them as he would see the irrationality in them. Nevertheless, we wonder what these alternatives he speaks of are. Is it the short courses in dress-making, cosmetology, masonry, carpentry and so on which is hardly sufficient to make attendees proficient in the respective skill? Or is it the promised lands for displaced workers? Simply, there have been no real alternatives for the thousands displaced; and for a great lot, they are simply living dayto-day. We wonder too where is it that the GAWU prevented the Administration or GuySuCo from paying severance. As the nation well knows, it is the Government which denied the workers their lawful payments. And, as the public knows too it was the GAWU that took the matter to the Courts which awarded interests to the workers and handed the Administration another loss at the judicial level.

Continued on page eight (8) Continued from four (4) PAGE FOUR

Wales cane cutters receive severance pay - more sugar workers being laid off

Cane cutters of Wales picketing outside the Ministry of the Presidency on February 01 calling on the Government and GuySuCo to settle its obligations to them

Following an order of the High Court on December 05, those 350 cane cutters of the closed Wales Estate have received their severance payments by December 12, 2018. As the media reported, the workers who never worked at Uitvlugt will be severed effective from December 31, 2016 and will benefit from 4 per cent interest per annum up to the time of judgment. Those who would have taken up work at Uitvlugt will also benefit from severance funds.

On December 07, payments regarding 238 workers who have never worked at Uitvlugt commenced. GuySuCo on December 12, 2018 began to distribute payments to the 109 workers who took up work at Uitvlugt Estate, some full time and some others who dropped out as well. The workers who were deprived of their severance for two (2) years are most delighted at finally being paid and it is apt to recall the long, time-consuming and unnecessary struggle for them to have their rights respected, bearing in mind that the Government and GuySuCo strongly contended that work was offered

to them at Uitvlugt, hence the denial of their lawful payments. Many workers expressed their appreciation to GAWU for the Union’s efforts, including the legal challenge on their behalf.

While workers at Wales Estate, closed nearly two (2) years ago, are being paid, GuySuCo, at the same time, is in the process of informing workers it retained at Skeldon, Rose Hall, East Demerara and Wales Estates that they would be terminated by year-end or sometime early next year. These workers, who were involved mainly in security, drainage and irrigation and power house operations, were retained to maintain skeleton operations of the now closed estates. The Corporation indicated that it was always its intention to have the workers terminated and it is now giving effect to its intent.

GuySuCo has assured GAWU that it has monies to pay these workers their severance payments as it becomes due. It is indeed saddening that more workers have had to lose their jobs, occasioned by the short-sighted and wrong, haphazard decision to minimize the sugar industry.

Pay hike and other improvements for SILWFC employees - workforce fully endorses negotiations Negotiations between the GAWU and the Sugar Industry Labour Welfare Fund Committee (SILWFC) yielded a five (5) per cent across-the-board rise in pay for year 2018.

nior Clerk and above levels receiving $65,000. The bursary award was hiked by $5,000 and the shoe allowance was increased by $1,000 and is now $9,000 annually.

Also, the parties also agreed to a $5,000 increase in the year-end bonus with employees below the level of Senior Clerk receiving $60,000 and those at the Se-

Members of the negotiating team, including the shop stewards, received the full endorsement of the workforce for the successful negotiations.

COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

Minister Lawerence’s comments out of place The FITUG, like the Guyanese public, was taken aback by the utterances attributed to Minister of Public Health and recently-elected PNC Chairperson, Volda Lawerence. According to online news outfit Demerara Waves, the Public Health Minister, at a recently held PNC activity, reportedly told her audience, “[t]he only friends I got is PNC so the only people I gon give wuk to is PNC and right now I looking for a doctor who can talk Spanish or Portuguese, and ah want one that is PNC”. While the Federation respects and upholds the Minister’s right, like all Guyanese, to associate with whom they wish to associate with, at the same time, her admission of sorts that she will only employ persons from a particular political grouping cannot be condoned nor tolerated.

While such an approach is fraught with dangers, and can, in all likelihood, lead to square pegs in round holes, something not in the interest of the Guyanese people, the Minister’s reported statement has legal implications as well. The FITUG wishes to draw to the Minister’s attention that the Prevention of Discrimination Act says what the Minister is apparently doing or seeking to do is illegal. That Act says at Section 4(1) “[f]or the purposes of this Act, a person discriminates against another person if the first mentioned person makes, on any or the grounds mentioned in subsection (2), any distinction, exclusion or preference the intent or effect of which is to nullify or impair equality of opportunity or treatment in any employment or occupation”. Section 4(2)(b), which identifies several grounds for discrimination, among other things, clearly lists that political opinion is a discriminatory ground. By the Minister’s statement, it appears, conflicts with the Act. FITUG is a staunch supporter that jobs must be granted to those who have the relevant

qualification and experience, and no other consideration should determine or influence potential job seekers.

The FITUG found it interesting that Minister of State, Joseph Harmon, according to a Demerara Waves report, told students attending the Bertram Collins College of Public Service, during a lecture he delivered, that the “…new public service, therefore, has to be able to deliver in an administratively neutral way, and has to be established firmly on the basis of merit and political impartiality”. The statement by Minister Harmon is in stark contrast to what his colleague was reportedly telling the party faithful. Of course, it also brings into question what is the real policy of the Government in recruiting potential employees.

From the FITUG’s point of view, it is clear as day that the statement by the Minister demands an immediate examination of employment at the Ministry of Public Health during her stint, to determine whether the best persons were really employed. A similar approach also has to be extended to the Ministry of Social Protection, which Minister Lawerence previously headed before becoming Public Health Minister. Indeed, it may well require a full scale audit of all employment under the Coalition to determine how far entrenched were such policies.

The entire episode brings back into mind the alleged practice during the Forbes Burnham Administration; that in order to secure employment in the public service one first had to be a card-carrying PNC member.

At this time, the FITUG calls on President David Granger, as the Head of State and PNC Leader, to immediately put a brake to such practices. We believe it will not help to promote His Excellency’s cause of Social Cohesiveness among all Guyanese.

GAWU/BBCI agree on 2018 package

- workers benefit from pay hike and other improvements Negotiations for pay hike, improvement in certain benefits and a year-end bonus between the Management of the Berbice Bridge Company Inc (BBCI) and the Union concluded in late December, 2018.

The agreement allows for an acrossthe-board pay increase by 2.5 per cent,

meals and standby allowances and night premium are pegged at higher rates. A year-end bonus was also approved.

The Union’s delegation at the negotiations, which included the shop stewards, were commended by the workers for their representation.

PAGE FIVE

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Remembering William Blum: Washington’s Destructive Imperial Agenda

William Blum

By Stephen Lendman Author, historian, former State Department official-turned sharp critic of Washington’s destructive imperial agenda, William Blum passed away on December 9 at age 85. In failing health for some time, his condition deteriorated markedly after a serious fall at home and he passed away two months later. I’m personally indebted to Blum. His books and other writings inspired my own, notably his book titled “Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower.”

It documented Washington’s imperial agenda from 1945 – 2005, explaining how the US tried or succeeded in toppling over 40 governments worldwide. It crushed dozens of popular movements, slaughtering millions of people post-9/11 alone, along with pouring countless trillions down a black hole of waste, fraud and abuse at the expense of vital homeland needs gone begging, eroding social justice, targeted for elimination altogether. The US interferes in the internal affairs of virtually all other countries, including their elections, wanting their ruling authorities bowing to its will, independent ones targeted for regime change by color revolutions, old-fashioned coups, or imperial wars.

Blum’s documentation showed US policies are “worse than you imagine,” stressing: “If you flip over the rock of American foreign policy (throughout) the past century, this is what crawls out: invasions, bombings, (subversion), overthrowing governments, suppressing (popular) movements for social change, assassinating political leaders, perverting elections, manipulating labor unions, manufacturing COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

‘news,’ death squads, torture, (chemical), biological (and nuclear) warfare, (radiological contamination), drug trafficking, mercenaries,” police state repression, and endless wars on humanity. That’s what imperialism is all about. Blum stressed it’s not a pretty picture – “enough to give imperialism a bad name.”

Millions of corpses attest to America’s barbarity, a rogue state like no others in world history, operating globally, willing to risk destroying planet earth to own it, the human cost of its wars and other harshness of no consequence. Blum called democracy “America’s deadliest export,” the way it should be abhorrent in the US and other Western countries.

Post-WW II, Washington’s monstrous “war machine has been on auto pilot,” Blum explained, documenting disturbing truths about the US in his books, Anti-Empire Report, and other writings. US regimes targeted, and continue targeting, populist or nationalist movements in numerous countries worldwide for elimination, wanting pro-Western puppet regimes replacing them.

Washington tried influencing presidential elections scores of times post-WW II – post-9/11 in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Yemen, Egypt, Tunisia, Honduras, Paraguay, Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Russia, and elsewhere. The above interventionism excludes military coups and other regime change efforts in Iran, Guatemala, Chile, Honduras, Nicaragua, and numerous other countries. Blum documented disturbing truths about America’s post-WW II history.

In 1967, he left the State Department over US aggression in Southeast Asia, massacring millions to advance its imperium – an agenda begun in the mid-19th century, accelerated post-WW II, endless wars waged from then to now against nations threatening no one, countless millions slaughtered, the human toll of no consequence.

Blum co-founded and edited the Washington Free Press, the first alternative newspaper in the nation’s capital, he explained. His journalism was the way it’s supposed to be, truth-telling on major domestic and geopolitical issues prioritized – polar opposite how major Western and most other world media operate.

In the mid-1970s, he worked with former CIA official Philip Agree and his associates, exposing CIA high crimes since its 1947 founding. His books, translated into over 15 languages, include America’s Deadliest Export: Democracy – The Truth About US Foreign Policy and Everything

Else (2013), Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower (updated edition 2005), West-Bloc Dissident: A Cold War Memoir (2002), and Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire (2004). They explain the dark side of US history not taught in US or other Western institutions of higher learning except by professors like James Petras, John McMurtry, Francis Boyle, Michel Chossudovsky, Edward Said, Edward Herman, Howard Zinn, Michael Parenti, John Kozy, Michael Mandel, and

other distinguished academics like them.

Like Blum, they inspired my writing and activism, my passion for truth-telling, my opposition to Washington’s imperial agenda and neoliberal harshness, my aspiration for a world safe and fit to live in.

Blum will be sorely missed. He and other distinguished figures I cherish as colleagues and valued friends inspired me and countless others to work for the kind of world we envision – moral, righteous, free, just, and egalitarian at peace.

PSUV sweeps Local Council Elections

PSUV leaders in Maracaibo celebrated after a successful electoral victory

By Lucas Koerner Venezuela’s governing United Socialist Party (PSUV) won a landslide victory in local council elections held on December 09, claiming 95 percent of the initially declared seats. Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) revealed that after tallying 92.3 percent of all votes the PSUV had won 591 of the 623 municipal council seats.

President Nicolas Maduro congratulated his team, urging them to get to work to solve widespread problems in transport and public services. Maduro also highlighted that this was Venezuela’s fifth election in 18 months, the ninth since he became president, and the twenty-fifth since 1998.

In total, 4,900 councillors were due to be elected across the 335 municipalities of the country, 1,073 via first-past-the post nominal votes, 685 by list, and 69 indigenous representatives. Fifty-one political organisations participated and 20.49 million Venezuelans and resident foreigners were eligible to vote at the 14,382 polling stations.

As with previous elections, the Venezuelan opposition was not unanimous in

its response to the vote, with four of the principal opposition organisations – First Justice, Popular Will, Democratic Action, and A New Era – claiming that the elections were fraudulent and discouraging participation. These parties were unable to participate in the process, having opted not to undergo the legal procedures to revalidate their party status, following boycotts of last December’s mayoral elections and May’s presidential vote.

Members of the international electoral accompaniment mission, which included representatives of the Council of Latin American Electoral Experts (CEELA), held a press conference, in which they highlighted the advanced technological nature of the electoral process, stressing that it took place in an environment of calm across the country.

The team also praised the numerous audits undertaken as part of the electoral process, claiming, “In no Latin American country does there exist so many audits.”

Finally, they recommended a longer campaigning period and “better levels of information regarding the relevance of the role of municipal councillors” in order to combat low turnout levels.

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France’s Yellow Vests: fuel tax hike triggers poverty, finances war and repays public debt

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky

under NATO auspices, controlled by the Pentagon and The Western media in chorus directed against Russia, is deupholds France’s President Mastroying France’s social fabric, cron against the Yellow Vests its Welfare State, leading to povMovement, which it describes erty and social despair. Guns as “Climate Deniers”. The New versus Butter: This mechanism York Times casually describes of NATO sponsored social dethe fuel tax hike as a carefully struction (coupled with neolibformulated economic policy to eral austerity measures) is opfight global climate change.It’s erating relentlessly throughout a lie. the European Union.

Hikes in the fuel tax applied Fuel taxes are being impleWorldwide in more than 120 mented in over 100 countries. countries are part of a packIn developing countries the age of deadly macro-economic hikes in fuel taxes are imposed reforms which serve to imby the World Bank on behalf of poverish large sectors of the creditor institutions. They are World population. The hike in part of the so-called structural gasoline prices translates into adjustment program (SAP) unincreases in the price of food, der the helm of the IMF and the transportation and essential World Bank. goods and services. It under- Protestors hold a banner reading “The people speak out” during a protest of ‘yellow vests’ against rising fuel pric- The hike in fuel prices leads mines the productive structure. es and living costs, in the southern French city of Nice on December 8, 2018 almost immediately to an inIt leads to the collapse of the crease in the prices of food and in NATO’s various “peace-making” ini- confirmed that defence spending would standard of living. transportation, hikes in the price of social tiatives in Eastern Europe and the Mid- increase by more than 40 per cent. The The tax on fuel serves the interests of dle East. services.

Bitter “economic medicine”: amounts of money that need to be colpowerful creditor institutions. The tax Clamping down on the Yellow Vest lected from tax revenues (including the The result is widespread poverty as well proceeds will be channelled into servic- protest movement is intimately related fuel tax) to finance France’s war economy as the bankruptcy of local producers. ing France’s spiralling public debt which to the War Economy, which is sustained are colossal. In turn the hike in military Oil is a multibillion dollar operation. is estimated at 2.2 trillion euros, equiv- by neoliberal austerity measures. On July expenditure is to be supported by dras- The oil giants have overlapping interests alent to 96.8 percent of GDP. Annual 13, ironically one day before Bastille Day, tic austerity measures directed against all in banking and the military industrial debt servicing obligations of the French President Emmanuel Macron signed into other categories of (civilian) expenditure. complex. They have a vested interest in Republic are staggering. The entire fiscal law the 2019-2025 military budget law Profit over people. What is at stake is a collecting the public debt as well as enstructure is in crisis. “clearing the way for a funding boost for process of lucrative military procurement abling the state to finance the war econThe tax on fuel will also serve to finance procurement for the Air Force, Army and through France’s Direction Générale omy. Taxes on fuel constitute a safety net mounting military expenditures (in ex- Navy”. pour l’Armement under the auspices of for both the creditors and the military cess of 30 billion euros per annum in industrial complex. The climate change Under the provisions of the military the Ministry of Defense.

2017) in support of France’s participation budget law, the Macron government In turn, this multibillion war economy pretext is a lie. Support the Yellow Vests.

250,000 near death in Yemen - 70% of nation’s people living with hunger

By Edith Lederer Twenty million people in war-torn Yemen are hungry - 70 per cent of the population, a 15 per cent increase from last year - and for the first time 250,000 are facing a “catastrophe”.

COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

U.N. humanitarian chief, Mark Lowcock said there has been “a significant, dramatic deterioration” of the humanitarian situation in the country and “it’s alarming.” He said that for the first time, 250,000 Yemenis are in Phase 5 on the global scale for classifying the severity

and magnitude of food insecurity and malnutrition - the severest level, defined as people facing “starvation, death and destitution.” The only other country where anyone is in Phase 5 is South Sudan, with 25,000 people affected, he added.

Lowcock said there are also nearly 5 million Yemenis in Phase 4, which is defined as the “emergency” level, in which people suffer from severe hunger and “very high acute malnutrition and excess mortality” or an extreme loss of income that will lead to severe food shortages. He said these people live in 152 of Yemen’s 333 districts, a sharp increase from 107 districts last year. Large numbers of people “have moved into a worse category of food insecurity” as a re-

sult of the war, Lowcock said.

Saudi-led airstrikes have hit schools, hospitals and wedding parties and killed thousands of Yemeni civilians. The Houthis have fired long-range missiles into Saudi Arabia and targeted vessels in the Red Sea. Civilians have borne the brunt of the conflict, which has killed over 10,000 people and created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

“There’s millions of Yemenis who are hungry and sick and scared and desperate and starving, but they’ve all got one message and their message is that they’re at the end of their tether and they want this war to stop,” Lowcock said.

He said “there are millions and millions of people whose plight would be much, much worse but for the ongoing relief operation,” which is currently reaching 8 million Yemenis.

PAGE SEVEN

Sugar workers heighten call for pay rise - stage picketing exercises outside of Parliament and estates

LEFT: Sugar workers picketing outside of Parliament on December 05 for pay increase, and RIGHT: Workers of Albion picketing outside of the estate on November 29 for a pay rise

In recent weeks, sugar workers have heightened their call for a pay rise, and have staged several picketing exercises calling on the GuySuCo and Government to approve a rise in pay. Sugar workers remain the only group of workers who have not received any rise in pay since the incumbent Government took office over three years ago. It is no secret that there has been a sharp rise in the cost-of-living over that period.

In fact, in the long time that has elapsed since the workers have not benefitted from any rise in pay, several burdensome policies have been implemented. For instance, when the workers last received a pay rise, now over 1,500 days ago, they hadn’t to pay value added taxes (VAT) on essential items like water, electricity and private medical care; they weren’t required to pay an environmental tax; the cost of fuel and public transportation were lower; they hadn’t to pay increased water and phone rates, among the several burdens that have now fallen on their backs. That apart, when the workers last got a pay rise they received a state grant for their school aged children, and they were not required to pay VAT on essential school supplies and food items.

With those serious challenges they have had to contend with, their work opportunities have markedly declined while their incentives like the Weekly Production Incentive (WPI) has been curtailed and their Annual Production Incentive (API), which dates back to colonial times, has been suspended. The magnitude of these and other decisions have seen their earnings falling by a whopping 36 per cent between 2014 and 2017. This substantial fall in income, taken together with the massive rise in living costs, has certainly pushed workers and their families closer to the poverty line.

It is indeed dismaying that the workers COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

are being treated so disdainfully vis-à-vis their colleagues in other areas of the State ,who themselves, in spite of pay increases, are finding the times of today difficult.

One can imagine the situation that therefore confronts the sugar workers and their families. Instructively, the last time workers were denied a pay increase was over three decades ago, and was in 1983 and 1984 when the Forbes Burnham administration, at that time, did not approve increases not only for the sugar workers but all public sector workers. The treatment of the sugar workers in recent times reeks of blatant and clear discrimination.

Again, the GAWU must ask what crime these workers committed to deserve such treatment being meted out to them. Is it that the Administration believes the contrived notion contained in its unreleased White Paper on Sugar dated March, 2017 that the workers are the opposition supporters? While this is far from the truth, it seems that this warped thinking could be a major factor in the current attitude of the State towards them.

The disturbing discriminatory treatment of the sugar workers, the GAWU noticed, was also recognized by the November 25 Stabroek News editorial which said, inter alia, it is “…unconscionable when one considers that workers in the productive sector, the sugar industry have not been considered for any type of improvement in conditions”. Indeed, in our view, the Stabroek News adequately summed up what seems to be stark discrimination against the sugar workers and their families. The GAWU is at a loss why sugar workers, it seems, have been singled out for such unwarranted and unnecessary treatment.

The differing approach to the sugar workers is glaring and most upsetting. Today, the sugar workers, like all the nation’s workers, have been badly pummelled by the Government’s anti-working class pol-

icies and measures.

The actions of the Government are a far cry from what it was saying to the sugar workers prior to it taking the reins.

For several years and on numerous occasions, the GAWU recalls some of our now-a-day leaders committed to grant workers significant pay rises. For instance, the November 05, 2011 Kaieteur News quotes now Second Vice President and Minister of Public Security, Khemraj Ramjattan, as saying, in reference to sugar workers’ pay increases, that his Party would “…make the workers even happier with 20 per cent…”. Minister Ramjattan’s colleague First Vice President and Prime Minister, Moses Nagamootoo, when in the Opposition, in his 2013 Budget Debate address at the penultimate paragraph said “[f]or the AFC, we remain firm

on a 10% wage increase for public servants and sugar workers”. Today, the workers, like the GAWU, ask what has happened to those rosy promises? It seems, from all appearances, they are solely intent on fooling the workers. On that score, we remind “once bitten, twice shy”.

Today, these hard-working productive Guyanese and their families have found themselves in the face of severe difficulties and hardships. Undoubtedly, the workers have grown restive and have seen the different, unsympathetic, approach adopted. As Guyana and the world, in a few days times, observe the year-end holidays, a time characterized by charity and togetherness, the GAWU calls on the powers-that-be to treat sugar workers fairly and bring an end to the eye pass and disrespect meted out to them

Prime Minister... a toothless poodle

The Prime Minister also reportedly said “…that the union wanted outstanding payments to be deducted before the workers received their benefits”. Again, it seems the Prime Minister is not thinking straight.

His statement is a complete figment of his unsettled mind, and it shows the desperation and low depths he has descended in seeking to find scapegoats for the callous decision that he and his colleagues have made. We warn the Prime Minister that history and future generations will not treat such a legacy kindly.

The GAWU sees the ad hominem attacks and empty words by the Prime Minister as nothing more than a sordid, futile attempt to find a hardly credible excuse for the minimization of the sugar in-

dustry and the destruction of the well-being and welfare of thousands of ordinary Guyanese. Today, as the Prime Minister is enjoying the grand benefits of high political office and hanging on dearly for survival, his naked attempt at mudslinging has failed miserably and roundly. He knows, like many Guyanese know, that he has been reduced to a toothless poodle and has become a mere shadow of what he was perceived by many to be. Notwithstanding the state he finds himself, we wish to suggest that he seeks to give meaning to what he said in 2010 when he wrote “[t]he Government would do well also to explore all possibilities to give the sugar workers even a nominal wage increase”.

PAGE EIGHT

Minister Ramjattan should apologise to sugar workers The GAWU was extremely dismayed to hear and to read about the utterances of Vice President and Minister of Public Security, Khemraj Ramjattan during his contribution to the 2019 National debate. Indeed when looking at the Minister’s expressions one had to wonder what was going through the Minister’s mind, if anything at all, as his statements could only be seen as divisive and his unhelpful remarks will not do any good in realizing greater cohesion among our people.

Our Union, from a Demerara Waves report of December 06, saw that Minister Ramjattan, ignominiously, sought to give cover to his colleague Minister of Public Health and PNC Chairperson, Volda Lawerence when he sought, in vain, to equate her recent viral comments to the jobs of now terminated sugar workers.

The Minister is quoted as saying that “[y]ou want to say that that is wrong but when you state all the time that you got to employ sugar workers, you got to employ sugar workers that is not wrong. That is not jobs for the boys? Oh! That is not jobs for the boys. If it is anything it is also jobs for the boys”. The GAWU, and we believe many persons, are perplexed by Minister Ramjattan’s statement. Indeed, his statement has hardly any justification or credence. Moreover, the use of such derogatory terms to describe the employment of thousands of ordinary Guyanese workers has no basis anywhere, much less the highest House of the land. But then again the goodly Minister Ramjattan is no stranger to putting his foot in his mouth and has always been a lightning rod of controversy. That notwithstanding, the Minister’s statement is inexcusable and he should follow his colleague Minister Lawrence and do the decent thing and apologise.

But the Minister’s outlandishness seems to have no bounds, nor brake for that matter, as he continued his tirade and said to the Parliament and the nation that“[y]ou want us to employ your people…”. This sort of language and outburst has absolutely no place in our contemporary society. We for fifty-two (52) years now, have proudly called ourselves Guyanese and have committed ourselves to being “One People”, to having “One Nation” and to working towards “One Destiny”.

The exclamation by Minister Ramjattan is, therefore, nothing less than a slap in the face of our national ideals and objectives and what we as Guyanese have committed to upholding. But the fact that the Minister has chosen to venture in the direction he did can only serve to add fuel to the fire that the minimization of the sugar industry has no other basis than a political motive. For the GAWU, the Minister’s utterances bear a striking resemblance to what was said on page 4 COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

Workers of Blairmont calling for a pay rise on November 27

of the, so far, unreleased White Paper on Sugar, dated March 16, 2017, which said “[m]ost of the employees of GuySuCo are supporters of the Opposition political party, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP)” These Guyanese who the Minister now deems the sugar workers as “your people” were the very same people he canvassed and received their support to place him in the ivory tower he now occupies. The Minister, prior to where he is today, had said on March 29, 2015 at Whim that “[w] e are not going to, in any way, close the sugar industry”. The now Minister said, when he sat on the other side of the House, in his 2014 Budget debate contribution said that “I want to make the point that when it comes to sugar, it touches a chord in all of us – this side of the aisle and that side. It is important that we ensure that that sector succeeds...”. So we ask what has happened between then and now. For us it is as clear as day that the Minister recognizing his waning political fortunes, now that his opportunism is fully exposed, has shed all his pretensions and will do all that is necessary to maintain his now favoured lifestyle.

The Minister, according to Demerara Waves, also said that the Opposition claimed that the Government “...never loved sugar workers and that we fool them…”. But isn’t that exactly what the APNU+AFC has done. The Administration has been most unsympathetic to the cry and call of the sugar workers. It had denied them pay increases and reduced benefits and for several thousand made them joblessness and placing them in a most miserable situation. Today, the workers have to fight for their lawful severance; they have to protest to be treated like their counterparts in other parts of the State, and they have to raise their voices to be respected. Today, the promised ‘Good Life’ has become a meaningless and hollow slogan. Now, Guyanese are being fed another slogan - “Wait on Oil”.

The Public Security Minister also in his contribution is quoted to say that “…the

administration every month for 36 months Guysuco wanted 1 billion dollars to bail out sugar and we gave it to them and when we gave it to them we started getting criticism…”. But for the large investment the Minister referred to, did the Government get value? Between 2015 and 2017, sugar production fell from 231,000 tonnes in 2015, 183,000 tonnes in 2016, and 136,000 tonnes in 2017. During that period, workers average earnings declined by $284,000. But in the same time, monies accruing to GuySuCo’s Key Management personnel doubled. While the Minister, it appears, is decrying the support the Administration gave to the sugar industry, he seems to not be aware that by the end of 2019, his Government will spend $1.2T that is $1,200B. In other words, the sums provided to the sugar industry represented just 3 per cent of aggregate expenditure. When one considers that impact, on an economic and a social level, the relatively small sum was more than justifiable.

The Minister in his rant said too that “… we must pump more, we must pump more.

No! We will certainly have to bring it to an end”. Well what does bringing it to an end mean? To say the least, it means the Trea-

sury will have to find more monies for Drainage and Irrigation, already roughly $1B in supplementary allocations were sought for this purpose. It also means more monies to address crime and other anti-social behaviour in sugar communities. It will also mean that NIS and GRA will lose thousands of contributors apart from other taxes arising from the consumption of goods and services by now jobless sugar workers. But the unquantifiable and probably the most devastating impact will come through the shattering of dreams, the abandoning of aspirations, the breaking-up of families, alcohol and other abuse, and so many other things.

The Public Security Minister is reported to have said too it was “…well-known that sugar would have been no longer profitable…”. It seems the Minister was there but yet not present during the socalled consultation meetings between the Government and the Opposition and the Trade Unions regarding the future of the sugar industry in February, 2017.

Certainly, had he been really present he would have known that sugar’s successful future lied in a transformation to the sugar cane industry which the GAWU spoke extensively about and provided a written submission to him, among other Government officials. Those suggestions were also contained in the Sugar CoI report as well, a copy of which he received. To now come and say that sugar is unprofitable when, at this very time, his Government is talking about strategies identical to what GAWU and the CoI proposed is to be engaged in the practice of fake news.

The GAWU repeats that Minister Ramjattan’s latest tirade on sugar suggests that an apology is the least and right thing to do in the circumstances. He may also do a service to the nation by relinquishing his Ministerial status and, may be, take on some other job more related to his ability.

GAWU clinches year-end bonus for AMCAR employees Employees of the Union’s newest bargaining unit – Amazon Caribbean (Guyana) Limited (AMCAR) – benefitted from a year-end bonus. The Union strongly pressed that the workers be awarded in view of their contribution to higher production the company recorded in 2018.

The bonus took into account of each worker years of service. It came on the heels of the GAWU and AMCAR inking on October 22, the first Collective Labour Agreement. The agreement covered for¬ty-eight (48) articles and addresses issues, including rates of pay,

probationary pe¬riod, promotion, acting and responsibil¬ity allowances, discipline, hours of work, overtime, meal allowances, and filling of vacancies.

In December, 2017 GAWU and the Company signed a Recognition and Avoidance and Settlement of Disputes Agreement which accorded GAWU recognition status for the Company’s employees at its Rosignol, West Bank Berbice factory. The mainly female workforce, numbering 35, are engaged in the processing and canning of Heart of the Palm.

PAGE NINE

Budget 2019 unfit and improper

Continued from page twelve (12) Redundant sugar workers non-existent in Government’s eyes Cde Speaker, the Minister on the pen-ultimate page of his address said, inter alia, “…have taken the tough decisions…”. It appears that Minister Jordan, has borrowed his colleague Vice President Ramjattan often used quip, as he seemingly referred to the Administration’s short-sighted decision to close four (4) sugar estates and put 7,000 Guyanese workers out of work.

Today, Cde Speaker, many of those rendered jobless have been unable to recover from that decision and are facing severe hardships. Interestingly, the Minister on page 61 of his address said the sugar sector “…has huge potential for growth, being pivotal to increasing household incomes, reducing unemployment and, ultimately, lowering the poverty rate”. So if this is the case, Cde Speaker, why did the Government close the estates and created thousands of new poor? Clearly, this further serves to demonstrate the callousness of the decision to minimize the industry.

Sugar industry downplayed Cde Speaker, the sugar industry still plays a pivotal role and touches the lives of tens of thousands of Guyanese. It is, therefore, disheartening to record the obvious confusion in the industry. The Minister tells us by 2021, the industry will produce 145,000 tonnes of sugar, 48 per cent more than what the industry is anticipated to produce this year. While we of the PPP/C want the industry to succeed, the Government’s approach has been hopscotching to say the least Cde Speaker, the Finance Minister now tells us that the massive production increase will be realized through the re-capitalization plans contained in the Sugar Task Force three-year plan for GuySuCo. But Cde Speaker, apart maybe from a select few, no one has the plan that the Minister speaks about though we COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

continue to hear about it. In fact, the sudden news of a plan is a surprise to many considering that President Granger in his address to the National Assembly on October 18, said a plan was being drafted. Cde Speaker this so-called plan must be made public and for there to be a full and comprehensive discussion of it by the stakeholders.

A new Demerara Bridge – another talking point Cde Speaker, as an MP representing Region #3, I recognized that $100M has been allocated to evaluate proposals for the construction of a high-level four-lane Bridge. This latest allocation comes after reportedly $160M was spent on a feasibility study that the PPC pointed out was improperly procured. Cde Speaker, the new bridge, it seems, will come into conflict with Exxon’s shore base at Houston.

In fact during a recent visit to the identified site, it appeared to me, that there is no space to accommodate the Bridge unless billions are expended to acquire private property in that area. Indeed, with these possible heavy costs before the first inch of the bridge is actually built, it seems the tolls will rival the charges that the Berbice Bridge was seeking to implement.

Conclusion Cde Speaker, Budget 2019 is ‘unfit and improper’ and will not inspire Guyanese that better days are ahead. Indeed, it was felt that the Government, recognizing the dire message from the Local Government elections results, would have woken up and recognized the dissatisfaction among Guyanese. Budget 2019 indicates that this is not the case and the Government has continued to perpetuate its unpopular measures, this is not an encouraging sign.

On this score, Cde Speaker, I, like my colleagues and all right-thinking Guyanese, cannot support Budget 2019. I urge the Government to recall the Budget and return with a more realistic plan.

GAWU concerned about GuySuCo-NICIL conflict The GAWU was indeed very concerned after reading an article titled “GuySuCo managers, staff to up protest against NICIL” which appeared in the December 17, Stabroek News. From the news report, our Union learnt that relations between the GuySuCo and the NICILSPU have now descended to the point that protests by GuySuCo personnel are being planned to ventilate their seeming frustrations with what they feel are the unhelpful actions of NICIL regarding the revitalization of the sugar corporation. We recognized the Stabroek News reporting that the “…National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL) is not working in the best interest of GuySuCo and that a NICIL takeover will further destabilize the Corporation and the country”. This could very well be the case if the situation is left to fester as it has been for several months now.

For the GAWU, and more so the thousands of sugar workers employed by the Corporation, the escalating public spat, though it can be argued that it has now descended to full blown conflict, is most disturbing especially considering the consequences such actions could have on many ordinary Guyanese. Indeed, the sugar industry, in the period of this Government, has been treated with what appears to be clear scorn and unconcern.

When we look at the treatment and approach to sugar in the approximate three and a half years of the APNU+AFC, it is hard not to get that feeling. On that score, we recall the disowning of the industry, earlier this year, by both the Ministers of Agriculture and Finance.

The Government’s concern, or lack thereof, was recently manifested in the utterances of officials during the just concluded 2019 Budget debates. Most significantly, we recall Vice President and Minister of Public Security, Khemraj Ramjattan, according to a Demerara Waves report, labelling sugar workers as “your people” notwithstanding that in the 2015 Elections Campaign he had promised Guyanese not to close the sugar industry. Then his colleague Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo, in his contribution to the 2019 Budget debate, was reported as saying “[i]t had become unsustainable to operate the sugar industry without bringing the entire economy down!”.

Indeed, the current confusion of the sugar industry has to be laid squarely and fully at the door step of the Government.

While the Stabroek News reports that “[t] he discord between GuySuCo and NICIL is seen as deeply embarrassing to the government”, we do not believe this is the case. If it were as troubling, as the Stabroek News points out, then, in our view, the Administration had more than ample time to fully and comprehensively address the matter.

Nevertheless, it is in the interest of the country and its people for the discord that has reached a boiling point to be addressed. The GAWU, once more, reiterates its call for the Administration to address the issue frontally. It has been allowed to prolong for far too long and with an eye on the industry’s future there is need to bring the matter to an end in the interest of all concerned, especially the workers.

Improved benefits for GFC employees - pay rise, increased allowances, and year-end bonus approved

Engagements at the bargaining table between the GAWU and the Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC) have resulted in employees benefitting in increases in pay. Through the engagements, employees earning less than $100,000 a month will receive a seven per cent increase; those earning between $100,000 and $299,999 will get an increase of 6.5 per cent, while those in the $300,000 to $499,999 range will get a five per cent increase. The increas-

es in pay are similar to those approved by the Government of Guyana for public sector employees.

The Union also negotiated new rates of meals allowances and employees now will receive $1,000 for breakfast, and $1,500 for lunch and dinner. A year-end bonus of $25,000 was also approved while the sewing allowance was also increased by $600 per uniform.

PAGE TEN

Government heartless to sugar workers - engaged in spewing hollow, meaningless rhetoric

The GAWU recognized from several sections of the media that as the APNU+AFC Government as it was seeking to portray confidence as it faced a no confidence motion in the National Assembly on December 21, through a statement, had listed what seems to be its achievements. While we are aware that Governments tend to highlight their successes, at the same time, they are expected to be honest and forthright in what they are saying. On this score, when our Union looked at what the Coalition said about the sugar industry, we could not help but be saddened by the deceptive lengths the Administration has gone to as it seeks to tout its accomplishments.

On sugar, the Administration points out “[e]ven with the closure of some estates, and the right-sizing of GuySuCo, the jobs of 10,000 sugar workers have been protected and production at only three estates has netted, so far, 105,000 tonnes of sugar for 2018”. It is disheartening that the Administration has sought to whitewash the loss of 7,000 jobs and the misery that greets tens of thousands of Guyanese as “rightsizing”. Well-known commentator, Mr Christopher Ram in a December 19, Inews Guyana article is quoted to have said “[t]he people need employment; they need support and it seems that they’re almost forgotten and its cynical, it’s callous and it’s cruel”. Mr Ram went on to say “… you can’t take away their lifeline, the very essence of the community and think that you have solved the problem and you’ve created some extremely costly social problems”. The Inews further quotes Ram to say “[t]eachers are pooling money to give a meal to children. That child is a human being who is going to grow into an adult and what is he or she going to do?”. While we are happy to know that the Guyanese spirit for compassion and charity is alive and well, at the same time, we must ask how can our people have confidence in a Government that is doing heartless things to its people? For the GAWU, what is worse is that the Administration was warned repeatedly that such situations would emerge and yet it callously closed the estates without a thought about the future of these ordinary Guyanese.

The Coalition goes on to speak about 10,000 jobs being protected, but GuySuCo told our Union at the end of August, 2018 it had 7,970 workers in its employ.

Of that 463 were retained at the now closed estates and will be terminated soon as the Corporation ends its operations at those estates. But putting that aside for a COMBAT 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2018

moment, for the 7,000 plus workers who remain they exist in a most confused state-of-mind as they see playing out in the public the tug-of-war regarding the industry’s operations. We recognise Mr Ram saying too “[w]hat we have is chaos, confusion and misdirection…”. They see $30B being borrowed but nothing substantial being done. They know that while there is talk to revitalize the industry there is no plan to guide that process.

GAWU and the workers want the industry to be protected, as the Government says, but the Administration really needs to get its house in order.

The Government boasts about the production this year, an achievement but-

tressed by the hard work, dedication and commitment of the thousands of sugar workers. But for those efforts this Government which says “…everyone… deserve to enjoy the good life”, has not given the sugar workers any increase in pay since it took office more than three and a half years ago. Today, apart from a wage freeze, the sugar workers lot has not only stagnated but declined as well although the Administration is telling workers they have “…every reason to be hopeful that their lot would further improve in the near future”. Undoubtedly, the Government in trying to take some shame out if its face has offered the workers a bonus which is under discussion. At the end of the day, the bonus while welcome, at the same time, will see workers in 2019 earning the same rates-of-pay that were approved since in 2014. Indeed, if the Administration is really sincere then it would seek to right this wrong committed against the

clearly hard-working sugar workers.

But the Administration entered the stage of obscene absurdity when it tells the Guyanese pubic, seemingly unashamedly, that “[m]any sugar workers were rehired…”. A great lot of the terminated sugar workers remain jobless securing odd jobs usually lasting for a few days.

The evidence is there, naked for the eye to see. The GAWU recalls, the September 20, Stabroek News quoted one worker as saying “[m]e a go beg for security wuk to keep me children in school and me na get nothing, job na deh”. Another ex-worker, Patrick Mahendrasingh saying “[t]his government want me to commit suicide or murder just to send me children them to

school, days when me deh home me ah sit and cry to think that I can’t able take care of my children them…”. The September 30, Guyana Times also quoted ex-worker, Eon Collymore as saying “I does work all over. Sometimes I does be at the sawmill and sometimes by the koker with a man and help him to bring out wallaba pickets.

Sometimes I gone and fetch up the coast but right now the paddy work get stiff because they bring in grain carts. Since the estate close down, sometimes you catch day work, sometimes you ain’t catch nothing”.

That article also quotes Avinash Singh, who also was put on the breadline, saying “[w]ithout a job and without money and have a family to look after, certain times you does get frustrated and you could do anything to get money because you don’t want to wake up in the night and your kids tell you that they are hungry and you don’t have anything to give them”. Another, former worker Royston Garnett is reported

by the October 27, Guyana Times International edition to say “[h]e remembers collecting his letter and the hot tears that started to roll down his cheeks making their way to his toes. His entire body was numb.

He didn’t cry for himself, rather he cried for the hardships his children would have to face. Yes, he was pessimistic from the beginning, because he knew that there was only so much he could do for a number of reasons. Garnett now spends his days going around in search of employment, only to be told that there are not any jobs available for him owing to a number of factors, particularly his age as well as the fact that ‘business bad’”. Certainly, this reduces the credence of the Government’s assertion to zero. To claim otherwise, is to add insult to injury.

The Administration, ignobly and has the gall to say too, that the workers “… all were paid severance with interest”.

We cannot help but wonder how much lower can the Administration sink. The struggle for the jobless sugar workers to receive their lawful severance payments is one of the most shameful episodes of this Government. As the public well knows, the Administration, in another of it’s too oft Rip Van Winkle moments, didn’t cater to pay the workers and then proceeded at past the eleventh hour to pay workers half of their entitlements.

The Government’s conduct which was contrary to the Termination of Employment and Severance Pay Act, forced GAWU to approach the Courts which ruled in the workers favour and awarded interests. It was not, due to the Coalition’s benevolence, as it seeks to portray, but it is an order of the Judiciary that caused interests to be paid. The GAWU recalls too that when the supplementary allocation regarding the severance pay was being addressed in the National Assembly on October 31, the Minister of Agriculture virtually ruled out any interest to the workers. For the Administration to come now and pat itself on the back for this achievement birthed from the workers struggles, is to be as low as one can get.

While the Administration mouths-off, the fact remains that there is little substance for all that cheap talk. Today the listing of these seeming achievements, reminds us of the glorious promises of the elections campaign. Those commitments, as we all know, turned out to be hollow, meaningless rhetoric.

PAGE ELEVEN

GAWU President, Komal Chand says:

Budget 2019 - unfit and improper

Cde Speaker, I rise to make my contribution to this meanour of the Administration. Cde Speaker, not even increased minibus fare which, I must add, 2019 Budget debate. The Budget, now several days old, one sentence in the Minister’s approximate 260 minute was increased by the Administration after it has been digested by the Guyanese people who, at this address referred to any plan to enhance workers’ rights adamantly rejected calls to reduce the taxes time, are unable to see how it will make their lives better. and protections. Indeed, they are quite a few matters to on fuel.

Cde Speaker, indeed this fifth budget of the Coalition, address some requiring legislation or amendments to like its predecessors, continues to push our people back- existing acts. By ignoring these realities, Cde Speaker, On this matter, I wish to remind the Government that ward rather than taking them forward and upward. It is the Government is exposing, unfortunately, its lack of in the AFC column appearing in May 03, 2015 Kaidisappointing to say, Cde Speaker, the confidence in the concern for the working-people. future, the Guyanese people had prior to the Coalition Cde Speaker, the Administration also saw it necessary eteur News it was said that if elected, the APNU+AFC taking office has all but evaporated. to allocate several million dollars to the Golden Jubi- Government would “[i]ncrease the personal income tax While our people are uneasy, the Administration at lee of Republicanism in 2020. Indeed it is a memorable threshold to $100,000 in a phased approach”. Cde Speakpage 19 of the Budget says it wants “…every family being moment in our country’s history and one that will re- er, I wonder what has happened to that promise?

The Budget, Cde Speaker, on page 88 says “…the wages able to afford a healthy lifestyle, with all the basic needs of quire celebration and reflection. But Cde Speaker, while and salaries of public servants will be increased in 2019, sustenance, shelter and education being met, and… where monies are found to plan for celebrations more than a after discussions with the respective unions”. environmental responsibility and personal safeCde Speaker, permit me to emphasize collecty are paramount”. Those indeed are lofty astive bargaining is not an option; it is an obligapirations, but are we being taken there? We of tion which was enshrined in our Statue Book the PPP/C, and very many Guyanese, are conby the PPP/C Government. It was among the vinced that this is not the case. Our today reseveral rights that the PPP/C gave the workers alities are very, very different from the utopian of Guyana. Cde Speaker, I also wish to remind paradise the Government seeks to paint. This the Minister that his Government on page 25 obviously is a glaring indication of the Adminof its manifesto said it would “[e]nforce the istration’s disconnect from the ordinary peoPrinciples and Laws Governing Collective Barple. Cde Speaker, my colleagues on the other gaining”. Today, this commitment rings holside need to step out from their ivory towers low. The Government really, Cde Speaker, has to see how the working-people are faring. It to stop putting its foot in its mouth. is no secret that business has slowed to a near The Minister also said on page 25 of his adhalt; our markets have more vendors than dress that the Government is “…committed to buyers; many of our children walk to school as continuously improve wages and salaries of all their parents are unable to afford transportapublic sector employees”. That general statetion; crime stalks the land and hardly anyone ment must be taken against what GPSU Presfeels safe. Today, hunger is knocking on many doors and growing numbers can ill-afford to GAWU President, Komal Chand delivering his 2019 Budget debate contribution ident, Patrick Yarde said, reportedly, in the November 15, Guyana Times that “…public pay their bills. Such are our sad realities of to- on December 04 in the National Assembly servants are receiving ‘poverty payments’ for day. salaries”. In fact, the Minister boasting about We are told too, that this is the largest budthe $50,400 retroactive payment, works out to $138 a get in the nation’s history. Indeed, $300B is a large sum year away, I do not see the same attention given to the day barely the price of a pine tart! and if properly utilized it could do a lot for our heavily centennial anniversary of Trade Unionism will be celeCde Speaker, for me it is sad to note that the sugar burdened people. The disturbing fact, however, is we, brated in our country in a matter of weeks. This, too, is workers have received the worst treatment at the hands given our experience, have almost ‘no confidence’ that a momentous achievement for our people, more so for of this Administration.

Not even the days of the Burnthis will really be the case. Cde Speaker, in the life of this our workers. The Administration’s silence, Cde Speaker, ham Administration had the sugar workers been treated APNU+AFC Government, taking Budget 2019 into ac- says a mouthful. count, the Government would have spent an astounding This Budget, Cde Speaker, is not worker friendly. Of as disdainfully as they are now. Can you imagine, Cde $1.2T. To make a comparison, it took the last seven (7) the twenty-eight (28) budgetary measures proposed, Speaker, while the Government is trumpeting its palbudgets – that is from 2008 to 2014 – of the PPP/C Ad- only one concerns a marginal improvement in our try increases it didn’t even give the sugar workers that! ministration to spend a similar sum. But for that invest- working-people’s well-being. At the same time, there These workers did not get one blind cent in pay increase ment, the economy grew cumulatively by 28.2 per cent; are several measures aimed at assisting the business since the APNU+AFC took office. It is baffling to unold age pensioners received increases in pensions apart sector, which are important, but we should remember derstand, Cde Speaker, why are the sugar workers being from water and electricity subsidies; school-aged chil- that thriving businesses rely on people who can afford treated so shabbily. One can only conclude that this is dren benefitted from $10,000 grant; our hospitals and their goods and services. The glaring absence of equity, plain eye-pass and blatant discrimination by this anhealth centres had an adequate supply of medication; among other factors, could, therefore, negatively affect ti-worker administration. our workers were generally satisfied, apart from the all- the intended objectives. round development, our people witnessed. Under the The Government, Cde Speaker, is boasting about Our pensioners and vulnerable ignored Another issue warranting attention is the increase in APNU+AFC, for that investment we are promised 15.7 the adjustments to the income tax threshold as if the the old-aged pensions and public assistance. Cde Speakper cent economic expansion, and our pensioners have Scrooge-like improvement were some grand conceslost their subsidies; our children lost their grant; the sion. The fact that the Administration has resorted to er, I wonder whether the Administration is not embarhospitals and clinics are often out of drugs; thousands of clutching at straws is yet another indication that the rassed to talk about its treatment of those entitled to Guyanese have been made jobless; and development has Budget lacks any substantive policy to really alleviate such benefits. It seems clear to us, that the Administration shows scant regard for the country’s elderly and slowed tremendously. our people’s burdens. vulnerable. The $1,000 per month increase works out to $32 per day. What a shame! Is this all the biggest budget Nothing for the workers Cde Speaker, the increase in the tax threshin our history can afford?

Cde Speaker from the workers point of view, Budget 2019 really has nothing for them to be excited about and is yet another indicator of the anti-working-class de-

old works out to workers receiving $47 more a day which cannot even take care of the

Continued on page ten (10)

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