Minister of Labour, Manzoor Nadir, has challenged the United States Government to produce evidence of child labour in Guyana, and to provide proof that they removed 984 children from exploitative situations here. Minister Nadir was responding to United States’ Ambassador, Luis C de Baca who claimed that he (Nadir) was not the subject minister at the time when the US-sponsored project “Combating Exploitive Child Labour through Education” was signed.
“I have noticed in response to my colleague Minister Manickchand, Ambassador C de Baca has condescendingly dismissed my call for the U.S. to produce the evidence of child labour here, saying I was not the Minister,” Minister Nadir remarked.
He noted that both Ministers of Education, Shaik Baksh and himself served as the relevant Ministers during the life of the project called, “EDUCARE”.
The TIP 2010 report states that the U.S. Department of Labour withdrew 984 children from employment in logging, saw-milling, fishing, hazardous farming, factory work, mining, and freight handling from 2005 to 2009.
Minister Nadir questioned why after four years of being on the ground, EDUCARE failed to mention to either the Education or Labour ministries that they had found instances of child labour.
“I again vehemently deny that there was any project in Guyana that ever removed over 984 children from exploitative child labour or prevented 2000 (plus) from entering such. I am absolutely certain that the project which the Hon. Ambassador is referring to, did not, absolutely did not, achieve this super-human feat,” the Labour Minister maintained.
He stressed that the final report was “falsified and fabricated” by the contractors of the U.S. Department of Labour, who were hired to execute the project.
Minister Nadir pointed out that the Ambassador may be finding it difficult, because of his position, to exercise a modicum of humility and accept that the U.S. administration was duped by the EDUCARE principals.
He further stated that government is confident and adamant that the report is factually inaccurate, intellectually dishonest and those responsible have blatantly defrauded U.S. taxpayers.
The Labour Minister flogged the local operatives at the U.S. embassy, who, he said, have a responsibility to verify the accuracy of reports.
“The Government is not surprised. At least twice in the last three years the Government has had to correct erroneous statements made by managers of this project. In June 2007, there was a perception that 90 percent of Guyana’s children were engaged in the worst forms of child labour.”
In the project’s 2007 mid-term review, nothing was said about removing children from exploitation; instead the review mentioned that the partners were way behind in matching the funds it was contracted to provide and also behind in the delivery of the project.
“Clearly EDUCARE was only after the floating funds in the U.S. Department of Labour. In their own survey of 2008, EDUCARE stated they found very low levels of the worst forms of child labour in Guyana. This contradicts their current TIP statements.”
The Minister added that were the EDUCARE report accurate, then in the 65 weeks after the mid-term review, the project would have removed almost 15 children each week from exploitative labour since it ended in 2009.
Guyana in 2005 did agree to the project, not because it was inundated with cases of child labour, but because it was felt that the resources, properly expended, could assist with truancy and dropout challenges.
The government has cooperated with the U.S. on the issue of trafficking in persons and has taken action in the area of legislation and implementation, but the goal post keeps changing and Guyana remains, in the eyes of the US, where it started, Minister Nadir said.
“Similarly, with the U.S. proclamations on Child Labour, we have had meetings with Assistant Deputy Secretary of Labour, Charlotte Pontechelli, in December 2007, in DC.  She sent a team to Guyana to talk to us and do their own assessments. The Caribbean Ambassadors in DC met with the TIP office there in 2009. A U.S. TIP team came to Guyana and insisted we must get prosecutions again, shifting the goal post. Now the stage has been set to put Guyana on the radar as a child labour country.  It is so done without verifiable proof and without any justification,” he added.
Nadir said the TIP and embassy officials seem all too concerned with their careers and profits and will go lengths to falsify and forge evidence to achieve their selfish goals, and with total disregard for the harm and damage it can cause an entire nation.
He related that were cases indeed found, one would think that the U.S. had a responsibility to inform the administration so that a full investigation and the necessary prosecution can be executed.
“Since they have confidently and boldly made this claim, the Government of Guyana asks that the U.S. provide the names of the children and where they were placed. The statutes of limitations have not run out and the government can still prosecute errant employers for engaging in child labour,” Minister Nadir said. (GINA)