Dear Editor,
PLEASE allow me space in your letter column to make an appeal to all, especially sugar workers and their families, who will be casting their votes come 2nd, March 2020. This is the day that they or we all as voters will have the opportunity to make the wisest decision and by doing so we will know if we voted with our conscience or if we voted to see our country go back into the hands of those who once held it to themselves, families, friends and cronies.

Brothers and sisters, we all have a part to play in ensuring that Guyana continues to move positively forward and that we secure a brighter and better Guyana by voting not because of our race, but because what we saw happened or has been happening since 1992 to the present day. My brothers and sisters in the sugar industry, you would recall that before 1992 Regional and General Elections the PPP and GAWU were by your side fighting that sugar workers and their families needed a better life, better wages, better working conditions, etc. You would all also recall the only ways the PPP and GAWU could have ensured their voices were being heard is by calling strikes and holding massive Labour\May Day rallies that used to be from Bath Settlement Old Well Square to Dhanar Gas Station Square in Cotton Tree Village, Region Five.

Thousands would turn out at those rallies to show their full support and loyalty to the PPP and GAWU and would walk the distance to show their strength in the fight towards a better life. Dr. Jagan and a number of high-ranking PPPites and GAWU executives including our now Prime Minister Hon Moses Nagamootoo and the late Navin Chandarpal normally took to the stage.

Those were the men who would appeal or should I say beg the workers to stay strong and support the PPP and GAWU whenever they made the call for strikes and for the workers and their families to fully support the PPP to get into government. That was the aim and objective of the PPP and GAWU: to ensure that they used the sugar workers and their families towards winning the 1992 General and Regional Elections.

In 1993 after the PPP gained government, what happened? The rallies were done away with, that was not even a full year after. The PPP since then started to take away several benefits from the sugar workers. GAWU stopped their representatives from calling strikes, because any strike by the workers would be a slap in the face of the PPP government.
Later in the PPP administration they closed down several sugar estates such as Diamond, LBI, Ogle and Lusignan. All this happened under Jagdeo administration. Thousands of Sugar workers became jobless, their lives and their families’ lives were destroyed. Workers were knocked off without being given their severance pay; they had to wait years after before they could have gotten a dollar from the PPP and GAWU, because they were the deciding factors in making the decision to pay or not.

So, the PPP and GAWU know what they were up to by ensuring that the hard working class of sugar workers suffered while they in the PPP and GAWU enjoyed the benefits. Not at one time, that I know of, did GAWU refuse to collect union dues from the workers and the PPP said nothing to GAWU. We all know why. Brothers and sisters in the sugar industry, this is the same PPP and GAWU that sat and lay in bed planning how to ensure your future and families’ future is dim after they (PPP) knew that they were going to lose the 2015 elections. They had a well planned agenda for you the sugar workers in ensuring that they (PPP) continue to use you by peddling lies and most of all frustrate your heads, so they can play with your brains in having your support.

It was the PPP’s Bharrat Jagdeo administration and GAWU that started to destroy your lives as sugar workers. They are the ones who invested in the Skeldon Sugar Factory that is now a scrap metal yard or some say white or dead elephant because the PPP had no vision. They could have upgraded the other factories and ensured that all the factories are in good, sound working condition. But no, if they had done that they could not have fooled you the sugar workers and your families to believe in them; rather, they wanted to keep you in the dark and ensure you are kept as PPP slaves, so that when elections come they will have your votes. All along GAWU kept quiet.

It was with the same PPP administration that GAWU once again sat and planned how to make you the sugar workers and your families suffer more badly and they hired one of their cronies in the likes of Raj Singh to run the sugar industry. They offered or should I say instilled upon this man a wealthy or super wealthy package to run the industry. This man was getting millions of dollars monthly as a salary, free air fares, free driver, etc just to sit and say what Bharrat Jagdeo wanted him to say and do.

Why I say this? Which man or person in the world would run a large company like Guysuco and didn’t know that the company wasn’t making a profit? Which man would run should a large company and don’t check to know what’s the income and expense of the company? Which man would run such a large company and never report the truth to its directors? Where in the world would a company as large as Guysuco would its board of directors sit and never ask for any financial statement? And if they did, then they should have known that the said man is running the company down. Lots more questions can be asked.

But GAWU sat with the PPP and allowed those very questions to go and moreover, allowed their friend who was running the company to do what he wanted and how he wants as long as the PPP administration was in power. This is the very PPP CEO days after the PPP lost the 2015 elections, who dropped a bombshell on the industry and its workers by telling the elected APNU+AFC government that the sugar industry was bankrupt and for it to continue it needs lots of money or else it will have to be closed down in a few days’ time. People of this great land, especially sugar workers, you all know the truth when the man (CEO) said that to this government and you all know that it was a well-planned strategy in keeping the truth from you about the industry. I fully believed that the PPP and GAWU are the ones that made that plan. There is no doubt.

Brothers and sisters, especially those who will be casting their votes and were sugar workers and those who are still working in the sugar belt, think for yourselves and then vote. What has the PPP and GAWU done for you since 1992-2015? Where was GAWU when you needed their representation under the PPP? Why is it the head of GAWU, who has been in the top brass of the PPP for years not letting loose of the leadership of GAWU?
Think for yourselves as to who are the ones who caused this downfall of the sugar industry. Think about the days that the other estates were closed under PPP and why GAWU didn’t call a strike. Think as to why is it that under this APNU+AFC administration GAWU is demanding you to strike so that you cannot earn to take care of your families, but yet taking out their fair share of union dues, even if you work only two days for the week.

Open your minds and see who are the ones who care for you and who don’t, but just wants your vote. If GAWU and the PPP care so much for you the sugar workers and your families, then why is it that they fooled you for almost 23 years and continuing to do same? When you go in that booth think about those very things and then vote. A vote for the PPP is a vote to destroy Guyana and your lives. A vote for the PPP is a vote to ensure they bring back the suffering to this land with lies and deception.

Come March 2nd, vote for a party with a vision, vote for a party that has you at heart and, vote for a party that will ensure there is a better life with a better and brighter Guyana for all. Vote for the APNU+AFC and let the progress continue.

Regards
Abel Seetaram