Workers at various sugar estates across the country yesterday continued their strike after they were informed that they will not receive their customary one-week, holiday-with-pay (HWP) today because of cash flow problems.
On Friday last, GuySuCo sent a letter to the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) informing that it was unable to make the payments because of cash flow problems.
This caused workers at the Albion, Rose Hall, Enmore, Wales and Uitvlugt estates to protest since they were expecting the extra money that is usually given to them at the end of the crop.
Yesterday, GuySuCo’s Human Resources Director Jairam Petam told Stabroek News that the company had not refused to pay the workers the customary HWP, rather the payment was just delayed because of the “unfavourable cash flow”.
Petam said “low production is because of low turnout during the season and also the unfavourable weather that forced the company to prematurely close the crop.”
GuySuCo’s inability to make the payments to the workers had caused them, especially those at Wales, to blame the union.
The workers said the union had not done anything to assist them. They stated too that since they began their strike, union officials had not visited them.
The letter from GuySuCo informing the union of its inability to make the payments stated, “As you are aware by practice, qualified workers are usually awarded Holiday with Pay no more than two weeks after the closure of a crop.
Toward that end, those estates which ceased grinding during week ending May 11, 2012 should be effecting payment of the award on week ending 25th May, 2012. Unfortunately due to our unfavourable cash flow situation, we are not in a situation to make that payment.”
GAWU said it wanted the corporation to secure financial support “from whatever legal source” to pay workers their HWP money, and for them to identify a positive date for the payment.
GuySuCo also came under criticism lately after mechanical tillage operators at the Wales Estate were informed that the beginning of their working day would be pushed back one hour, which caused them to strike.
The workers used yesterday’s strike to address that issue as well.
Mandat Singh, tillage operator at Wales Estate, accused the estate’s management of failing to keep promises made to GAWU, that the working time will remain at 6 am instead of the proposed 7 am. He also accused GuySuCo of deliberately failing to attend a meeting scheduled between the union and GuySuCo at the Ministry of Labour.
The strike began at the estate over a week ago when workers were informed that since it was the out-of-crop season, they should report for their regular duties at 7 am instead of the regular 6 am.
Wales Estate Manager, Devindra Kumar, had defended this move by GuySuCo stating that there was not much tillage activity in the fields, compared to crop season.
He said that was one of the major reasons the estate’s management took that decision, while noting that it would only apply during out-of-crop season.
Kumar further explained that the workers are usually designated to other parts of the estate, because of the lack of activity in their field, and those workers usually report for duty at 7 am thus the change.
This did not go well with the 70-plus workers who downed tools and took up placards to protest that decision. Several meetings between GuySuCo and GAWU officials had brought some closure to the matter and the workers had reported for duty at the regular time of 6 am but went back on strike after they were informed to report to work at 7 am on Wednesday.
Contacted yesterday, Kumar said, “The matter is really delicate at this time and as such I cannot comment on that right now.”
