GAWU responds to the PNC/R

The Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) views with grave concern the recent statement by the Main Opposition People’s National Congress (PNC) regarding what that Party said at a recent Press Conference. At that Press Conference the Party is reported to have said that there were huge wage increases which were given to sugar workers between 1990 and 2006, implying that sugar workers should not have been given the level of increases they received during that period.

This anti-sugar worker position of the PNC/R is not new.

It is recalled that it was the PNC, when in Government that denied workers of the Public Sector as well as Sugar Workers, of the $14.00 minimum wage in 1979. At the 1979 May Day Rally at the National Park the then Head of State asked rhetorically:- “Do you want the Hydro or the $14.00.” It is now history that the Guyanese people got neither.

For the nation’s information, between 1978 and 1992 the cumulative inflation was 426.06% and workers’ wages fell, in real terms, by 49.20% while between 1993 and 2007 inflation was 116.30% with workers’ wages rising in real terms by 45.85%. Even with the enhancement of workers’ purchasing power over the last fifteen (15) years, the same has not yet been restored to the former years.

If the Sugar Industry does not offer competitive wages, its decline will be once again certain as was evidenced in the years from 1988 to 1991 when the yearly average sugar production was merely 155,000 tonnes, causing a threat to the country’s economy and our sugar quota in Europe. The poor production had also forced the importation of sugar for domestic use. That was the first time sugar was imported since our country began to produce sugar in colonial days. It was truly a national disgrace!

Sugar Workers must beware of the PNC’s grudge of their wage levels which can be sincerely described as inadequate in the light of the rising cost-of-living resulting from the deep-seated crisis of present day Capitalism. Sixteen years in the Opposition and the PNC is still demonstrating its anti-working class character, especially discrimination against sugar workers whose toil, sweat and tears earn this country’s maximum foreign exchange. Should the PNC/R regain political power in Guyana it would be déjà vu.