–Scott, Lewis blame each other for not seeing matter through

RUSSIAN bauxite company, RUSAL has not yet paid the outstanding overtime and tax-exemptions due to their employees.
This is despite their recently being ordered by Minister within the Ministry of Social Protection, Keith Scott to make those payments immediately.

Both Scott and President of the Guyana Bauxite and General Workers’ Union (GB&GWU), Lincoln Lewis have confirmed that the workers are yet to be paid by the company, but blamed each other for not following up on the matter.

The Minister had officially ordered the company to pay the workers on November 17, 2017 after representatives of the company failed to sign a three-party Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), that would clear the way for the employees to be paid what was owed to them since October 2016.

The MoU was reportedly signed since October 2016 by the GB&GWU and Minister of Finance, Winston Jordan, but not by RUSAL, owing to “technical issues”.

“For over one year, the workers were expecting the union and the company to agree to have them receive their overtime and their deducted Income Tax in November 2016, which government had agreed to have the company return to them,” Scott said during a meeting with the RUSAL representatives and members of the Union in his office on Brickdam on November 17.

In RUSAL’s defence, one of its representatives, Vladimir Permyakov gave as the reason the company did not sign the MoU, that it was unprepared for that type of meeting at the time.

This was because they’d first needed to consult with their principal, who was out of the country at the time, Permyakov said.

He, however, assured Minister Scott and union representatives at the November 17 meeting, that the principal who is the company’s country manager, would have been back within a week, by which time he had expected that the matter would have been sorted out.
Unfortunately, it is now over a week and there has been no movement as yet on the matter, as workers are still to be paid and the MoU is reportedly yet to be signed by the company.

When contacted by the Guyana Chronicle on Monday, Minister Scott said the issue is now in the hands of the GB&GWU, since he had already ordered the company, by way of letter, to pay the workers.
Lewis, however, says the issue cannot be in the union’s hands since it was the minister who ordered the company to pay the workers.

“The government gave the instruction; not us… Plus, tax waivers are the responsibility of the government and not the union,” Lewis said.
He had said at the November 17 meeting that the union does not intend on taking any further action against RUSAL.