MS. LURLENE Nestor, in a letter published in the 2011-05-20 edition of Kaieteur News (KN), asks, “What about the bauxite workers, Mr. President?”  Let Prime Minister put straight the facts!  This PPP/C Government has been treating Bauxite Workers and Sugar Workers equitably, Lurlene! Yes, the Government recently assisted GUYSUCO in providing G$300 million to pay Severance Benefits to Sugar Workers of Diamond Estate.  And you know what Lurlene, this same Government, in the decade from about 1994, provided much larger sums to Bauxite Workers in meeting commitments to Workers, commitments that had not been met since the 1980s, during the era of the preceding PNC Government!  This Government’s assistance, in payments to Bauxite Workers, totalled:

Bauxite Workers’ Savings Scheme :                    32,031,254.
Un-met Submission of Workers’ PAYE/NIS :                         434,463,296.
Un-met Obligation to Bauxite Pension Scheme:                             98,000,000.
Retrenchment/Severance Pay :                             1,625,726,954.                        
———————
Total        (over 1994 to 2005)                 2,190,221,504.   
———————-
About 4,000 Bauxite Workers who, as mentioned in Ms. Nestor ‘s letter, were mostly Afro-Guyanese and who, in times past, would have mostly supported the PNC, benefited from that assistance.  These facts did not matter to the PPP/C then, when we supported the Bauxite Workers, and they do not matter now – it never will, for we, the PPP/C, see Guyanese all!  Prime Minister is one who benefited from some of that assistance, as an old Bauxite Worker.  He did support the assistance to the Bauxite Companies and Bauxite Workers!  He hopes that he would not be taken to task for a conflict of interest!

Additionally, this PPP/C Government has continued in closing the gap between what residents in Bauxite Communities pay and what are the real costs of providing electricity.  Such payments, over the recent years, have been:

2007            …..        1,799 million
2008            …..        2,237 million
2009            …..        1,690 million
2010            …..        2,130 million
2011 (projected)    …..        2,197 million

As His Excellency remarked at the opening of the Enmore Packaging Plant, this PPP/C Government is continuing with relevant, prudent support to transform operations of both Bauxite and Sugar Workers, along with their cultures and their communities, to re-fashioned, profitable operations, even as new, modern economic activities are being developed.

In her letter, referred to, Ms. Nestor tried to cleverly mix up the provision of severance to Workers in Diamond with industrial incidents involving some of the Bauxite Workers at Aroaima – a very different matter, and here again, this PPP/C Government, aware of the shortcomings of workers also, is acting equitably!

Ms. Nestor should recall President Bharrat Jagdeo’s address at the Enmore Martyrs’ Commemoration on June 16, 2009, when the President remarked, “You, Ms. Burton (then President of the GTUC), you did not speak the whole story, neither did you Komal (President of GAWU).  You, Komal, spoke about failures of management (of GUYSUCO), but you didn’t speak about the poor turn-out of workers!  I tell you, if we keep getting this poor turn-out at work, this company (GUYSUCO) would not survive.”  President Jagdeo again spoke about the crucial need for greatly-improved sugar workers’ turn-out and discipline, at the launching of the Packaging Plant at Enmore a few weeks ago.

Ms. Nestor should take note, also, of the article in the Guyana Times of 2011-05-20,  ‘“You must move with the times,” Jagdeo tells NAACIE Congress’.  A call for a re-thinking of traditional assumptions, attitudes and postures in industrial relations, was put explicitly by that outstanding union leader of Barbados, Sir Leroy Trotman, in his feature address to the CCWU Congress in the middle of last year.  Sir Roy questioned whether the words “more robust”, in the theme, could not mislead many into expecting that workers, union leaders, the general society and the Government ought to behave, and indeed would be behaving, in the same way as had been expected in the 1960s, when so much has changed since then!

From his overview – with many details provided – of the recent industrial incidents in the Aroaima-Kwakwani Bauxite Area, Prime Minister is wondering whether he is not seeing patterns of behaviour reminiscent of the 1960s and early 1970s, unacceptable patterns of behaviour which were tolerated, if not encouraged, then, in the run-up to nationalization shortly after independence.  Prime Minister wonders about this especially as he sees his old comrades from the late 1960s – Lincoln (Lewis) and Charles (Sampson) – in the leadership of the union at Aroaima!

If this PPP/C Government is in any way guilty of treating Bauxite Workers differently from Sugar Workers, it is in our reluctance to repeat to Bauxite Workers the same hard, cold facts of life that this Government has been saying to Sugar Workers – our reluctance to call on Bauxite Workers in Aroaima and residents in Bauxite Communities to move on with the times!  Prime Minister takes this opportunity to say so:  you must move with the times!  The assumptions and behaviour tolerated in the 60s are no longer acceptable; indiscipline amongst Bauxite Workers – indeed, amongst any worker – cannot be tolerated!  The survival of the Bauxite Companies, and the prospects for the Bauxite Communities, are at stake!

Prime Minister, at the same time, acknowledges the argument that workers, and society at large, may be left confused and may also be exploited when some of the traditional assumptions are questioned, and when a sufficiently complete, new understanding is not developed – a new understanding spelling out the privileges, obligations and responsibilities, and the behaviour of each party within enterprises and, indeed, across the whole society!  If Ms. Nestor, indeed, has the success of the Bauxite Workers and Communities at heart, she should join in moving them forward from the pre-nationalisation behavioural patterns of the 1960s to behaviour appropriate to the beginning of the second decade of the 21st century, within companies that required great support from the treasury and which were eventually re-privatized, rather than be ‘shut down’.