Dear Editor,
Permit me to respond to the irrational and obviously self-blinded Dr. Jerry Jailall, whose nonsensical rantings were carried in the Stabroek News on Wednesday August 3, 2022.
Editor, I am very offended that the writer has been allowed to malign the Guyana Public Service Union (GPSU), with claims of linkages to the PNC, without any shred of evidence. The GPSU is an apolitical Union that has no affiliation with the PNC or any other political party and has carried out its affairs, over its nearly 100 years of existence, without fear or favour to any political party. The GPSU also respects its members’ constitutional rights to freedom of association and allows them free rein, providing that their individual undertakings do not compromise their obligations to the Union.
As far as I am aware, no substantive President of the GPSU has ever acted premised on any affiliation with the PNC or other political party. Suffice it to say that this Union is on record as having the second longest nurses strike in the world of seventy-seven (77) days during the years 1990 and 1991, against the PNC Government of President Hugh Desmond Hoyte. The records would also show that the GPSU has had industrial actions and confrontations on issues concerning workers’ rights regardless of the political party in power. GPSU has no apology for any action it takes against any Government of Guyana, since positions for dealing with matters are mandated by the constitutional arms of the Union and are always in the interest of the Union Membership. The GPSU demands that Stabroek News entreat Dr. Jerry Jailall to produce the evidence of this malicious claim. I also dare him to provide any or all of the political clauses in the agreements the GPSU have executed with the PPP/C or PNC.
This is a great tragedy for all Guyana that the seemingly educated, cannot discern discrimination beyond a self-serving agenda, where based on the writer’s opinion the PPP/C: (a) neglected its “votes farm” Whim-Bloomfield NDC by not paving roads; (b) conducted “projects in Opposition strongholds, while their supporters’ communities especially in the rural areas languish for better roads, bridges, trenches to be dug, flood abatement, better schools, Internet access, healthcare, etc.”; (c) has refused to add “Indian” to Arrival Day; (d) “failed to make additional new awards of Senior Counsel”; and (e) “refused to keep its promise to give “Guardians of Democracy” awards”.
These are the writer’s lofty agenda, while Public Servants, employees of the state and the premier human resources of this Country suffer from the pangs of hunger, inability to finance the livelihoods of their families and are being further condemned to lives of desolation and hopelessness by constantly rising prices and unconscionable decisions of an uncaring Government. Dr. Jerry Jailall must be that proverbial ostrich, who is singing for a political appointment or is blind to anything beyond his ethnic mask, if he cannot see the plight of his fellow human beings or hear their cries of anguish. This fellow should be given an urgent dose of divine guidance and empathy that would enable him to understand that not all that rally against the discriminatory practices of the PPP/C Government must be PNC.
The Public Servants and Pensioners alike have given yeoman service to Guyana and therefore have a right to demand a living wage, to subsist above poverty level. It is upon the backs of these workers that the PPP/C Government claims its policy implementation successes. Public Service workers can validate that during their tenures they have contributed meaningfully to the development of our Country, but can the fisherfolk and others that have been so easily granted larger rewards and considerations claim the same? Other than supporting the PPP/C ballot box were they paying their rightful share of taxes? How does the writer define the payment of a two-week one-off bonus to some medical workers, who were part of the frontline work force working around the clock to save lives during the height of the COVID-19 Pandemic, compared to the one-off one-month bonus granted to the military or the grant of $250,000 that was paid to severed sugar workers, who had been properly paid severance benefits, or the $150,000 to fisherfolk, etc.? Can the writer rationalize or differentiate these occurrences, especially considering the meagre salaries of Public Servants?
Judging from the writer’s analogies, there is a pathetic display of the inability to comprehend economic and social dynamics surrounding Public Servants and therefore he chose to mentally decide that because GPSU is dissatisfied with the display of bad governance by the PPP/C Government, it had to be PNC. If this is not being mentally lazy, I don’t know what is.
The GPSU cares not of the writer’s useless comparison of the PPP/C and the PNC, but mainly of its members’ interest and good governance, which has been cunningly sidelined by the Government since it came to office. GPSU advises the writer to seek medical help for his apparent prolonged condition of amnesia, since he seems unaware that over the last twenty-four months the Union has been seeking “constructive engagement” with government, to no avail.
Yours sincerely,
Patrick Yarde
President/CEO
GPSU