AFTER years of fighting, the National Mine Workers Union of Guyana (NMWUG) was, on Tuesday, officially declared the recognised union of rank and file workers at the Aurora Gold Mines (AGM), owned by Canadian company Guyana Goldfields Inc.

The Union gained 52 percent support from workers in a recent union poll conducted at the company. “This is a victory not for the NMWUG or me but the workers of AGM,” NMWUG Founder and President Sherwayne Downer expressed following the poll. “I have been fighting since 2015 for AGM employees, so after four years of hard work and perseverance I have made it. It’s an extraordinary feeling because coming up against the country’s largest mining company with all their financial and human resources and influence, I feel that weak me have defeated the strong.”

The company Vice President, Investor Relations & Corporate Communications, Jacqueline Wagenaar, in an email response on Tuesday afternoon, however, noted that the company had not yet been informed of the decision. “To the best of our knowledge, the process to determine if there will be a union representing workers at AGM has not been completed by the Government of Guyana. The Government of Guyana has not communicated such a decision to us and our understanding is that the process is still ongoing and will take some time to complete. AGM abides by all labour laws and regulations in Guyana and has been actively engaging with workers and the Ministry of Social Protection’s Labour Office and will continue to do the same going forward,” Wagenaar said.

Downer however is moving ahead with his plans to represent workers even as he awaits their certificate of recognition from the Trade Union Recognition and Certification Board (TUR&CB) before moving towards establishing concrete agreements and arrangements with the company. In the interim he plans to begin engaging the company.
“In the meantime I will be approaching the company for permission for a visit to AGM and Buckhall locations for a familiarisation visit. The workers are demanding that in light of this announcement,” Downer explains.

The recognition decision was handed down by the Trade Union Recognition and Certification Board (TUR&CB) following a meeting at the Department of Labour (DoL) on Tuesday morning. The TUR&CB requires that a union garner at least 40 per cent of the workers’ votes to be eligible to represent the workers at a particular company or in a particular category. Chief Labour Officer, Charles Ogle, who is also TUR&CB Secretary, confirmed the Union’s win by 52 percent.

“They got 52 percent so they got through with the recognition certification. The Union now has to submit proposals to negotiate a procedural recognition agreement,” Ogle related.
It was in July that the call, by employees of the company, for a Union poll was heightened after workers downed tools, on July 2, over a dispute on severance pay, which aggravated an already strained situation between the employees and the company.
In March, Guyana Goldfields signed a mining agreement with Peruvian company, STRACON, a move that would see mining employees being transferred from being employees of Guyana Goldfields Inc. to being employees of STRACON.

The employees are contending that since they are leaving Guyana Goldfields Inc. and starting as new employees of STRACON, they are entitled to severance pay from Guyana Goldfields. The changeover was expected to take effect from July 1, so when that date passed and the employees still were not told about their severance payments, despite queries, they became frustrated. This resulted in the strike. The employees returned to work on July 5, after the Department of Labour stepped in to pacify the situation.