Some sugar workers on the Albion and Wales estates yesterday went on strike as the stormy relationship between the workers and GuySuCo on the annual production incentive and other matters continues.
The Corporation has meanwhile called for an end to the industrial action saying that it was in contravention of the extant Collective Labour Agreement (CLA) which has left the workers open to severe disciplinary action.
Workers on the Albion Estate yesterday protested the deplorable condition of the road they traverse daily to get to their workplace saying they are fed-up with the many promises the authorities have made to fix it.
They said the road has been in a state of disrepair for several years and that the estate had been “patching” the huge potholes with bauxite capping. However “as soon as the rain falls the material is washed away and the potholes get bigger,” they told this newspaper.
The workers are calling for a new road to be built and said the authorities should hire a reputable contractor to do the job to avoid it being damaged again within a short time.
They are also contending that although promises were made by the ministers during the last cabinet outreach in the areas “no one is giving a definite answer about when the work would be done.”
Regional Chairman, Zulfikar Mustapha told the Berbice media yesterday that provisions are in place for the work to be started as soon as possible. He also confirmed that a decision was taken for the road to be fixed during the cabinet outreach.
A Government Information Agency (GINA) press release stated too that during a meeting with residents of Chesney, Guava Bush and Belvedere, Minister of Local Government and Regional Development Kellawan Lall and Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon announced that the Albion Road will be repaired this year.
The strikers said their action was prompted after a worker who was cycling along the bumpy road was almost struck down by a motorist. They said that the driver was trying to manoeuvre around the potholes and almost hit the worker who fell in the process.
“The car could have run over him…,” they lamented. “This road is a death trap; it is an accident waiting to happen. It seems as though when someone dies then the authorities would take action.”
According to the workers, the road is causing damage to vehicles. They also said that drivers, including managers of the estate have resorted to diverting through the cross streets at Guava Bush and at the Post Office street at Nigg. Those streets are also being destroyed.
They also pointed out that the estate is paying its taxes and the local authority is supposed to maintain the road but is instead claiming that the “estate heavy vehicles breaking up the road. But that is why they should make the road for heavy vehicles.”
Further, some of the workers who also live in the area said when they go to the market they have to walk into the street with their heavy bags because the vehicles refuse to take them in.
Some of the placards the workers displayed read, “enough is enough; ease the suffering of your sugar workers,” “where is the Minister of Agriculture? Show some respect for sugar workers; do your job,” “no road, no sugar” and “no road, no vote.”
GuySuCo meanwhile accused the workers of striking over issues that had “nothing to do with management or their terms and conditions of employment” since the estate has no control over the road.
Workers on the Wales estate staged a picketing exercise yesterday morning over the failure of GuySuCo to pay the labourers their Annual Production Incentive (API) for 2009. Conciliation talks between GAWU and GuySuCo, which have been facilitated by the Labour Ministry, have been deadlocked for the past week and a half. GAWU has been calling for eight days pay for the production of 233,735 tonnes of sugar last year while GuySuCo is sticking to an offer of 3½ days pay, which was decreased from an original offer of four-days pay.
However, the Corporation said that what started out as a picketing exercise yesterday morning by 24 mechanical tillage workers turned into a full-fledged strike. The Sugar Corporation has called for an end to the strike action at Albion and Wales saying that it was in contravention of the extant Collective Labour Agreement (CLA). GuySuCo expressed their concerns in a letter sent to GAWU General Secretary Seepaul Narine which was also copied to the Chief Labour Officer and to NAACIE representatives. The Corporation said that NAACIE represented workers also participated in yesterday’s strikes.
In the letter, which Stabroek News saw a copy of, the Corporation, through its acting Head of Industrial Relations Francis Carryl said it was seriously dissatisfied over “the indiscipline and counterproductive behaviour” of your union’s bargaining unit.” The Corporation also said that it had communicated previously to GAWU that it was disgusted with the reprehensible behaviour of their members “who appear to be determined to inflict injury to the Corporation and the nation.” GuySuCo said that neither the union nor the workers had given the estates or the Corporation notice of their attention to strike.
The actions of the workers, GuySuCo contended, have left them open to serious disciplinary action. According to the Corporation, it reserves the right to impose appropriate sanctions on the indisciplined workers and on the unions.”
Concerning the payment of the API, GuySuCo told the unions if any formal strike action continues, it would not be in a position to make any award, “let alone the four days’ pay which was being offered at that time.”