Last week’s announcement by the Chief Executive Officer of the Russian-owned aluminum producer RUSAL, Evgenii Nikitin that the company plans to pump US$5.2 billion into the upgrading of its bauxite plants in the Caribbean will be met with mixed reactions here in Guyana where the company has a 90% share in the Berbice-based Aroaima Bauxite Company of Guyana Inc (BCGI), the other 10% of the shares being owned by the Government of Guyana.
In a country where unemployment is high and threatening to climb higher on the back of job losses resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic both the authorities here and the workers will be relieved to know that at least some jobs will be retained through RUSAL’s operations. Time was when the local subsidiary of the Russian aluminum giant, BCGI, used to produce and ship around 1.5 million tonnes of bauxite to the RUSAL-owned Nikolaev refinery in the Ukraine annually. Its licence also extended to bauxite mining at Linden, Kwakwani and Ituni, where much of the country’s bauxite is found.
What, in 2004, when the agreement that brought the BCGI into being, appeared like a good deal for both sides, collapsed into an unending stream of controversy as RUSAL’s managers, demonstrating little regard for the Government of Guyana as they did for the Guyanese workers, rubbished the Collective Labour Agreement which it signed with the local union representing the employees then took one or another form of draconian action at the slightest sign of protest. Eventually outlawing any union presence from the operations the RUSAL managers then turned their attention to a government that did little more than offer a weak and condescending frown whenever, as they frequently did, the Russian managers imposed themselves on the local work force. In a circumstance where employment in the areas where BCGI operates is scarce, whatever complaints accrue to what, going forward, will be the more dominant presence of the Russian management, will be stifled by the fact that the RUSAL presence and its increased investment will mean that at least some jobs are safe.
RUSAL has said that while it is pumping more money into its operations in the Caribbean, the main stage of its construction of new plants for its operations will begin in 2023. Financing, it says, is likely to come through commercial loans, backed by the Russian state.
If RUSAL’s continued presence in Guyana will be seen as a welcome sign from the standpoint of jobs, the workers, veterans of numerous confrontations with their Russian managers will probably be girding their loins for more face-offs with management arising mostly out of complaints regarding unsatisfactory working conditions or pay-related discrepancies. More than that, the workers will be aware that the ‘huffing and puffing’ that has attended interventions by government, across political administrations, has brought about no change in the situation.
RUSAL, and more specifically the Putin administration in Moscow will see the retention of its bauxite interests in the Caribbean, including Guyana, as strategic as much as economic. The Caribbean, Moscow understands, has become a region of enhanced strategic interest to the big powers particularly in circumstances where first, Guyana, then Suriname have struck what is believed to be among the world’s few remaining large deposits of oil and where Jamaica, another Caribbean country in which RUSAL has bauxite interests, is probably also on the verge of becoming an oil-producing nation.
Whether RUSAL’s announcement that it intends to pour more money into its Guyana operations is indicative of a corresponding decision to have its increased investment correspond with a more humane management regime is unclear. It will be recalled that the company, in 2019, moved to sack more than 300 workers in the wake of what it says was an illegal strike, causing the then Minister responsible for the sector, Raphael Trotman to threaten to take unspecified action against the company.
RUSAL will be aware, however, of its preeminent position in the global industry and of the fact that for all its unpalatable management regime what it is offering in terms of its investment in Guyana’s bauxite industry and more particularly in terms of the employment spinoff is almost certainly the best deal, going around.