Georgetown: A large number of workers from Enmore/LBI and Wales Estates Monday took part in a spirited picketing exercise outside of the Parliament to call attention to the difficulties and challenges which now confront or are in store for them and their families.
The workers, like all sugar workers, are anxious about the contents of the Government’s ‘White Paper’ which, was presented to Parliament Monday. That document, according to Government officials, will address the Administration’s plans for the future of the industry. Undoubtedly, workers and their families are eager to know, and at the same time worried, about their fate and their future.
For the Enmore/LBI contingent, they are strongly opposed to any plan by the Government and its Guyana Sugar Corporation Inc (GuySuCo) which will result in the closure of their estate. The workers are of the firm view that closure will herald unparalleled hardships for them and their families. Moreover, the workers are very much concerned that there are, seemingly, no plans to address the severe difficulties that they would face in the event of closure. In registering their disagreement, the workers have drawn attention to the on-going plight of their colleagues at Wales. They even question plans for non-sugar diversification, as far as they are aware, still remain on paper and are yet to be translated into any concrete initiative.
Prior to the Parliament exercise, the Enmore/LBI workers along with residents, among others, staged a march through several streets of Enmore Village. The march by the large number of persons saw many villagers expressing their disagreement with the plans for closure. The people of Enmore and the surrounding villages are also quite concerned about the spill off effects that can be expected as a result of the closure. They hold that the large pool of unemployed workers that would emerge following the estate’s closure would severely affect the village economy and could fuel increased criminal activity, among other things.
For the Enmore/LBI workers, they are of the strong view that their estate should not be closed. Indeed, they do not support the closure of any estate. They have pointed to the fairly new Enmore Packaging Plant through which the Corporation enjoys its highest prices for its sugar. The workers also have noted, over the years, the large investment in field conversion for mechanical operations in an effort to improve efficiency and reduce costs. Moreover, the possibilities for co-generation facilities at the Enmore factory serve to enhance the estate’s prospects.
For the Wales workers, Mondays picketing is intended to press their lawful demand for severance pay which is being denied to workers who were engaged in cane cutting and the transportation of canes from the fields to the factory by the GuySuCo.
“This matter was discussed with the team of Government Ministers and GuySuCo officials who visited the estate a few weeks ago. Since that interaction, despite promises for a response, the workers are yet to hear from the Administration or the sugar corporation. The affected workers, now jobless, are most disturbed by the high-handed approach being taken in addressing their rightful benefits,” one of the protestors said.
The picketing exercise is the latest in several such activities which have served to demonstrate the people’s disagreement with the Administration’s unsympathetic approach to the employees of the sugar industry.The workers and others are hopeful that their cries and pleas will be heard by those in power and that the ‘hard decisions’, as termed by Minister of Natural Resources, Raphael Trotman on Labour Day, are uncalled for and would be abandoned.
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