Over 300 cane-harvesters and weeders yesterday downed tools and protested in front of Freedom House in New Amsterdam over the high cost of living, which they attribute to the introduction of the Value-Added Tax (VAT) and for machinery to assist in harvesting.
The workers from the harvesting ‘P’ gang at Providence, East Bank Berbice and the harvesting ‘C’ gang at Rose Hall Estate, started a protest march from Lot 60 Stanleytown, around 7.30 am before voicing their concerns in front of Freedom House for about two hours. The workers complained given the 33 per cent deducted from their salaries as PAYE, six per cent for the National Insurance Scheme (NIS) and the 16% VAT in the shops they were now paying 55 per cent in taxes.
The Guyana Sugar Corporation (Guysuco) in a press statement yesterday said the strike hampered production since the 330 harvesters who participated in the strike had the potential to supply 135 punts of cane to the factory. The corporation said the workers from “harvesting P” “obstructed and forced 184 crop husbandry workers at Providence to join them in their protest. They also reportedly picketed the New Amsterdam branch of the Guyana Revenue Authority. Guysuco said the ‘C’ gang “demanded that the bell loaders (machines used to load canes that are cut manually) work with them at the harvesting site at Overwinning.” However, it said its field management has since advised the ‘C’ harvesters that once the weather improves the bell loaders would be deployed to work with them.
The company said the strike comes in the wake of a “special production incentive for the Berbice Estates” deal struck with the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) that would award “all piece, hourly, daily and weekly paid employees two days pay, in addition to the Annual Production and Weekly Production Incentives, for working 18 of the remaining 21 days in this crop.” Guysuco said the attendance on the Berbice estates, particularly at Albion, has declined considerably within recent weeks and as such a large amount of cane is being carried over into the first crop for 2008. This cane, it said, ought to have been harvested to maximise production this year and not only would it adversely affect production this year but it would yield diminished returns next year, because its advanced age would mean reduced sucrose content.
A representative for the protestors called on government officials “to intervene and reduce the VAT so that we can work and live; if not we would continue to suffer.” He told Stabroek News the one-day protest was called because “we cannot survive on the money we work for.”
Another protestor said after the deductions she barely has enough money to pay a high electricity bill, phone bill, run her home and send her children to school. The woman said prices for food and other household items “jump sky high.”
The protestors, dressed in their working gear and some carrying their lunch bags, said “the working class people” are being affected. They said the price for a bag of rice leapt from $2,500 to $4,000, while cooking gas has jumped from $3,300 to almost $4,000. They also complained that they do not have enough money to spend for the Christmas season.
In an invited comment, an official from GAWU in Berbice said they did not know that the workers had planned to protest. He said when they learnt about it, around 9.45am, they went to scene but the workers had already dispersed. However, the official said that the union plans to meet the workers to discuss the issue. The workers were also expected to meet the estate’s agriculture manager yesterday.
The union official told this newspaper that he did not see why the workers “would want to call a strike at this time of the year. This is the season for them to achieve their targets.”
He also said that the workers mistakenly believed that they paid PAYE on their entire wages when only part was taxed. However, he supported their claim that the high prices were affecting their livelihoods, though he posited that this was not only due to VAT as prices have increased on the world market.
