The dismissal of a GuySuCo employee for allegedly assaulting the Skeldon sugar estate manager will stand, the arbitrator, Mohamed Akeel ruled yesterday.
Stephen Daniels was dismissed in September over the matter. After strike action was launched by members of the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) it was later agreed as part of the terms of resumption that the dismissal would be amended to suspension without pay pending consideration of the matter under the aegis of the Ministry of Labour.
The ruling by Akeel yesterday at the headquarters of GAWU in Kingston leaves the matter in limbo.
Conciliation talks at the Ministry of Labour on the matter had failed and arbitration was ordered with former Chief Labour Officer Akeel being selected as the arbitrator.
Akeel yesterday said that Daniels is to remain dismissed and whether the dismissal was justified or not, he was unable to determine, bringing the arbitration to an end.
He said it was a difficult arbitration and the review of the action against Daniels required a lot of analysis. He stated further that there was a lot of grappling on whether Daniels was dismissed or suspended and as such he was tasked to rule on the disciplinary action taken against Daniels.
“The corporation’s position was that (Daniels) was dismissed and that the letter was amended to (suspension to) get persons back at work (from the strike),” he said, adding that he should have never been tasked with ruling on the disciplinary action.
“The terms of reference should have been clear and unambiguous but it seems that the parties could not interpret the terms of resumption that was agreed upon and signed,” he stated.
He noted that the dismissal was a penalty imposed by GuySuCo but the suspension was a result of a tripartite discussion, and so there was no “lack of justice” as GAWU was claiming. “It was not initiated by the corporation…so how could there be lack of justice?”
There was no definite period for the suspension and Akeel noted that the Chief Labour Officer, had made a recommendation for a date for the end of the suspension. This was ignored.
Akeel ruled that the suspension that Daniels was placed on was not a penalty.
He further stated that his preliminary finding that the suspension was not a penalty was not agreed upon by the union and as such he had sought to explain himself by holding meetings but the union failed to turn up.
The decision was handed down in the presence of the GuySuCo CEO Raj Singh and top union officials.
