Chiding the former APNU+AFC administration for the closure of sugar estates during its term in office, Member of Parliament (MP) Seepaul Narine yesterday reassured that the new PPP/C-led government will be reopening them.
Narine, making his maiden speech before the National Assembly and his contribution to the 2020 budget debate, argued that the A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) coalition “purposefully sought to demolish and destroy” the sugar industry.
According to him, there could be no other reasonable explanation for the coalition’s attitude to the industry and the tens of thousands who depended on its operations.
Narine, who is General Secretary of the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers’ Union, (GAWU), pointed out that sugar production last year was the worst in 80 years and that under APNU+AFC production fell by over 60%.
Narine underscored President Irfaan Ali’s commitment to reopen three of the closed estates “and to once more breathe life” into those communities which he said the now opposition turned into “ghost towns.”
The MP said that budget 2020 demonstrates the president’s commitment with the allocation of $5 billion dollars for the sugar industry.
He said that over 7,000 sugar workers had been put on the breadline in what he described as the most “callous, cruel and heartless” act which he said was described as the largest retrenchment exercise in post-independent Guyana.
According to Narine, the opposition while in government had no plan for the fallout which resulted from the retrenchment and accused it of “being least concerned” with how those affected “would eat, send their children to school or pay their bills.”
Narine surmised that this was spiteful on the opposition’s part.
Outlining his government’s plan to reopen the closed estates, Narine said that Minister of Agriculture Zulfikar Mustapha has already put together a team to commence work for the reopening of the Skeldon, Rose Hall and Enmore estates.
Narine said that the dawn of a new era for the sugar industry will unfold under the PPP/C government, which he said will ensure a capable board of directors with a competent management team to oversee the reopening process.
He said that billions of dollars’ worth of equipment were left to rot in the elements at the closed estates by the opposition and he called this development criminal.
The MP touted the industry as having several possibilities for success, before highlighting opportunities for electricity production, refined and packaged sugar, and alcohol and bottled molasses, among others.
He said that much was lost under the former administration, which did not appreciate the sugar industry’s importance to its workers and families and the nation’s economy at large. Among what he called the opposition’s “sins,” Narine said, was failing to increase the wages of sugar workers although all other state employees received annual increases.
Narine posited that the 2020 budget will impact upon the lives of every Guyanese “and align our development thrust with the needs of the people” and noted that while the coalition spoke of a better life for all, it had generated $91 billion in additional taxes “which was punishment for the Guyanese people.”
According to the GAWU General Secretary, the reestablishment of the Ministry of Labour shows the PPP/C’s commitment to respecting workers and having in place the framework to address their problems.
He said that contrary to the opposition’s claims of the budget being “pro-private sector” and having no benefit for the ordinary man, it presents plans, initiatives and programmes all geared at improving the wellbeing of all Guyanese.
“It was a much welcomed and marked departure from what APNU presented in the last five years when Guyanese feared what next would be increased and what else would be taken away from them,” Narine declared.
He told the Speaker that budget 2020 marks the first step in the journey to reverse what he called the “vampire-like” policies which he said plagued the nation under an APNU+AFC -led administration for the last five years.
Guyanese, Narine said, “had to pay all the way from the cradle to the grave.” “That was the life the coalition condemned the Guyanese people to,” he added.
The MP said that it was a time when many poor Guyanese faced troubled times to put meals on their tables, and had their gains swept away by the coalition government.
He further described budget 2020 as one of hope and as pro-people and progressive with significant attention to lifting working people and of hope for the benefit of all Guyanese.
