Sugar union GAWU yesterday publicly called for the removal of GuySuCo Chief Executive Officer, Sasenarine Singh, a move that will pile pressure on the government over the beleaguered industry.
The public call had been preceded by a May 24, 2022 letter to President Irfaan Ali calling for the removal of Singh on grounds of alleged incompetence. It is unclear whether Ali has responded to the union which is an influential stakeholder in the industry and has longstanding fraternal ties with the PPP/C. Singh could not be reached yesterday by Stabroek News for comment on the call for his removal.
As it has done in previous years, GAWU used the occasion of Enmore Martyrs Day to deliver hammer blows about the state of the industry which the PPP/C government had vowed in its 2020 manifesto to resuscitate.
Singh had been appointed on September 14, 2020 by the Ali administration to lead the revival of the industry but has faced numerous problems which have culminated in disastrous first crop sugar figures for 2022.
These figures were reported in Monday’s Stabroek News and were cited yesterday by GAWU.
Addressing the event to honour the lives of Lalla-bagee Kissoon, Pooran, Rambarran, Dookie, and Harry who were fatally shot at Enmore while struggling for better conditions in the sugar industry, GAWU President Seepaul Narine said that the industry remained in a difficult situation.
“…we remain apprehensive as we considered the recently concluded first crop. It simply was an appalling performance, the lowest first crop output in the history of the Corporation. We have heard the explanations of weather, labour and machinery. Such rationales, we contend, are over exemplified to obscure the real issue which is poor leadership and management of the industry. The degeneration has reached to the point where workers’ Credit Union savings deducted from their wages are not remitted. It was pleasing, therefore, to recognize the President taking a proactive approach when we saw a few days ago His Excellency reportedly reading the Riot Act to the current leadership of the Corporation. Indeed, it appears, the President and the GAWU’s views are aligned. However, we say to you Sir, action must be taken as a matter of urgency. We cannot allow the slide to continue. As the saying goes `Heads must roll’ and this should start from the topmost executive. Cde President, you summed it up rightly when you said revitalizing the industry was serious business. Do not allow the ineptness to embarrass your Government any longer”, Narine said frankly to Ali.
He also didn’t spare the former APNU+AFC government over its shuttering of sugar estates.
“The spiteful closure of estates during the term of the Coalition Government can never be forgiven nor forgotten. For tens of thousands of Guyanese, it remains a scar that may never heal. Indeed, to those who authored and executed such policies they deserve our widest condemnation. We are certain that when that chapter of national history is written it will not be kind to them”, he declared.
He said that the union was aware of the commitment by Ali and his Government to revitalize the industry. This, Narine said, has been tangibly demonstrated and the union has seen the efforts of several estates to improve capacity and capability.
“We are encouraged by those developments. We also note too that at some former estates there are commitments to pursue re-development which may take us in another direction”, as he then proceeded to make the case against Singh.
Uitvlugt
In the May 24 letter to Ali which was seen by Stabroek News, Narine cited the low sugar production figures and contended that problems with the Uitvlugt sugar factory could have been avoided. The factory produced marginally after a major problem developed at the factory.
Citing the low production figures, Narine said that these first crop production figures were registered after the Albion and Blairmont estates brought forward canes intended for the 2nd crop this year.
“This supports our views that canes were not present in fields to yield targets and the estimates were poorly constructed despite the company having a smaller operation to maintain and manage. In addition, the fiasco at Uitvlugt factory that caused the operations to cease for practically the entire 1st crop 2022 was preventable in our view, if risk assessments, sound engineering decisions, and forward planning were done by the corporation”, Narine said.
The GAWU President told Ali that the “seminal constraint” remained the inadequate amount of canes which GuySuCo measures as tonnes of cane per hectare (TCH). The union presented figures to show that the TCH over the last three years for Albion was 58.6 in 2020, 63.9 in 2021 and 40 in 2022. For Blairmont it was 57.9 in 2020, 64.1 in 2021 and 39.6 this year.
“The Corporation has sought to justify the situation by (adverting) to an absence of tillage. Indeed tillage is an important element of operations, but we add it is not the only element and by no means a silver bullet solution to the industry woes. Even when tillage is accomplished the results are dreadful. At Blairmont, for example, fields tilled and planted in 2021 and harvested during the recently concluded crop yielded 64.60 TCH. This is well below historical trends of at least 100 TCH for plant canes. The data speaks to wider agronomic issues and an apparent deviation from a scientific approach and longstanding practices”, Narine said.
He added that the performance of the industry could not be delinked from Singh.
“We firmly believe this office holder has displayed a capacity of incompetence to address the manifold tasks at hand. Since his appointment to office, we are treated to lofty speeches, presentations and media engagements about the current state and work that are aimed to reverse the industry’s decline. However, the results are not reflective of such attainments. Rather, the glimmers of recovery have been gradually fading and the industry is set back by the hemorrhaging of critical, experienced skills. It is now necessary, in our view, to have a competent head appointed while further efforts are made to strengthen management to arrest and reverse the situation. The industry is in dire need of technical skillsets”, Narine said.
