Dear Editor,
Is the Government simply “winging it” or does the Government have a plan? This week the VP and team were deluged with complaints by disgruntled supporters in Region 6. The Government does not appear to have a 5-year or 10-year National Development Plan. A party’s election manifesto is not a national development plan. What we have seen so far are random acts of cash grants being announced to various groups in a “Santa Claus,” “squeaky wheel gets the grease” approach. For instance, instead of root cause solutions for the Uitvlugt workers, a grant of $250,000 was announced for the recipients to “do business.” Exactly what type of businesses did the Government have in mind? Plantain chips and tamarind balls? So, you actually can give a canecutter a quarter million dollars and tell them, “Go forth and start a business,” just like that? How does this solve the root cause of their current unemployment due to no work available during the “out-of-crop” season? It does not. How about introducing a national “unemployment benefits” programme as part of an income support system? When that $250,000 is finished, sugar workers will need another cash grant, and another, unless we are doing “root cause” solutions. When I think about sugar, the song “Killing Me Softly” comes to mind, as they are giving away sugar lands, giving away the packaging plant that was supposed to help save sugar, destroying the sugar research fields, etc. As the people would say in the village, “Sugar dead but he shame fuh shut he eye.” The Government has not kept promises about revitalizing the sugar industry and are stringing the workers along because they don’t want to give the death announcement.
Are we going to be a hamper and cash grant operation based on what side of the bed our Guyana “god” woke up on? One morning we heard Berbice will get stadium, hotel, and mall. Next morning Uitvlugt cane cutters getting $250,000 to start business. Then, we hear fishermen getting $150,000 since the oil operations chasing away the fishes and “ting bad” with fishermen. So what’s next when the $150,000 runs out. The oil companies would have more wells in operation, and this is likely to harm fishing operations in a worse way. The “Our Wealth, Our Country” group reported that fishermen in Mahaicony asked for the bridge where the boats come in to be repaired and nothing has been done despite promises by Government people.
Also, the President himself chimed in with a $100,000 grant for the disabled. Then the Government announced $2+ billion in relief for the rich gold miners. Do gold miners need emergency relief above others? How about all those self-employed people who don’t have stable Government jobs with stable salaries and benefits – taxi drivers, carpenters, unskilled workers, market vendors, labourers? How about housewives (who work but don’t get pay), retail shop and restaurant workers, pensioners, security guards, the disabled, single parents, people on public assistance? With the little oil money coming in, we must take a sustainable, structural approach to revamping the compensation and income support structures. This is an area for Reform and Reinventing Government. While we must spend on physical infrastructure since we had been way behind and most villages have many mud roads that need paving, there must be a concurrent plan to roll out a new structure for a “living wage,” Cost-of-Living Adjustments (COLAs) across the board including annual increases in Old Age Pensions and NIS pensions. We must also create new structures of income support to cater for the army of self-employed people who do not qualify for NIS benefits and pensions. How about tax-free salaries similar to Exxon, HESS and CNOOC? I will support a Third Party who can promise a revamping of the Salary and Income Support system!
The announcements of projects and grants are commendable, but they all seem random and scattershot. There must be a “Plan” for cash grants, so everyone knows the timelines for which groups are getting grants, how much, and when. But cash grants are not a replacement for reinventing the compensation and income support structures which should be designed to trigger ongoing cost-of-living increases as part of a “living wage” approach. Unions must sue to enforce collective bargaining agreements and not allow themselves to be run over as happened under both the PNC and PPP. The minimum wage should be at least $100,000.
We can do better as a rich nation endowed with an abundance of natural resources, but we must replace all those “sellout” leaders with nationalist leaders with working class philosophies. Our leaders are working for the oil companies, not the people of Guyana. The Guyanese worker is going nowhere unless we are united as “One Guyana” fighting for renegotiation of the worst oil contract in the world. The contract is being defended by the PPP, PNC, and the oil imperialists on one side versus the working people of Guyana. Nation, wake up! It’s our wealth and our country. The rich getting richer, and you the poor, getting poorer. And they call this “One Guyana.”
Sincerely,
Dr. Jerry Jailall
