The debacle of bitter sweet sugar…

Dec 04, 2010 Letters

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Dear Editor,
Guyana’s sugar sector is in deep crisis. The workers in the sugar industry face an uncertain future with this present administration and this has fuelled the current state of affairs in the sector.
And, truth be told, it is the PPP, GAWU, Cheddi Jagan and the entire cabal in control and on stage that must hold up their hands and accept responsibility for the reality that is bitter sweet sugar in the Guyanese psyche.
There is no colonial master to blame now.
From the time of the Enmore Martyrs to his death Jagan utilised sugar, in all its manifestations, to impose his will on the country. Not ever the brilliant Burnham, who made strident efforts to undermine Jagan’s stranglehold on sugar, could undo it. Burnham, who imposed a sugar levy on the industry to divert money away from sugar workers, obviously to weaken Jagan in sugar, did not succeed. Jagan, who fought the levy in opposition, could not bring that draconian measure to an end as promised, during his own administration, to appease his own faithful supporters. A comedy of deceit.
Today we have President Bharrat Jagdeo, the ‘Strongman’, who listens to no man but his omnipotent self, blundering from pillar to post; Robert Persaud, who knows nothing of anything, not even about milk production, as the responsible/debacle minister, playing with a broom stick; ‘The Donald’ perpetually on the Board directing the sinking ship from three platforms – the GS, PPP and GAWU; GAWU and Komal Chand playing along, until recent times, when they began to wisen-up to the plight of the workers and the industry, and are now playing a zero tolerance sum game with and in defiance of their own Administration; The Association of Concerned Guyanese’s (ACG) Raj Singh of New York enjoying the largesse; CLICO’s Geeta Singh Knights, clean and knowledgeable hand in control of the levers of the industry. The Sugar Board is being treated as a paid vacation avenue instead of a serious management tool for a critical sector of the national economy. No wonder that sugar had gone the way it did – bitter. Bitterness begets bitterness.
What of the other Board members, Gopaul and the other sugar union, NACCIE, Keith Burrowes, far from sugar in the Ministry of Health. Of the whole board only two persons have relevant business there, Ragurai and Bheem, so no wonder that Errol Hanoman ran as fast as he did from the Board. And so too are the workers, either through legal migration or illegal immigration to our neighbouring countries, many times to work in sugar in those countries.
Now most times they, the Guyanese sugar families still in the industry, await the stipend they know will arrive monthly from sympathetic relatives who know first hand the eternal exploitation that their sisters and brothers are enduring in the motherland. At 200 to 1 why toil in any unsympathetic environment of bitter sugar.
These are not my words but ‘The Donald’s’: “Now we have a new dispensation with a government sympathetic to the working people. However, the centuries of confrontational relations between management and workers will not disappear in a day. We are experiencing a transitional hangover from our history,” Ramotar explains away. However, the very same sugar workers have faithfully, these last 50 years, gone and voted for these same sympathetic (sic) people day in and day out.
I grew up in rice in Black Bush Polder and saw the demise of entire families and settlements, including my own, when Burnham, Reid and the PNC dropped the price of rice in 1965. They were responsible for non-maintenance of drainage and irrigation in the agricultural areas. I witnessed sugar workers on the Corentyne buying a quarter pound of beef or pork for their family of eight or 10 at the many bank markets that sprang up at the GuySuCo pay offices on Friday afternoons.
These same workers used to come to me to change their Kalamaazoo pay slips to reflect that they had earned $5 less, just so that they could then pinch the $5 to steal a drink with their buddies at the corner shop, after all the ribbing of working in the fields all week, in the hot sun and drenching rain.
I also remember the rice families waiting on the postman to bring that postal check from the Rice Board to alleviate hunger in the farming household. Similarly, sugar families were never able to plan ahead as they never knew for certain that the bread earner was going to be paid a crop or annual bonus in time for the holidays.
Rampant was a hand-me-down life of the poor peasant and working class families. Now we hear the latest message from the latest self appointed sage, ‘The Donald’ once again: “The government has demonstrated its commitment to the industry by investing in the new packaging plant and the lending on concessional basis, funds to build the new Skeldon complex. Management and workers must also show a strong commitment to the industry. They have to also make sacrifices to ensure that the industry makes a successful readjustment and blossom forth even stronger,” he said {‘The Donald’}.
The PPP’s Donald continued that the industry was going through some difficulties, but it had a good future. Further, that, “the industry can produce 500 000 tons of sugar; it can be a major producer of industrial (refined) sugar; it can produce various specialty sugars, alcohol, electricity, ethanol, etc. It is therefore, important that we overcome this period rapidly so that the workers at all levels can benefit much more. Our country would also be stronger and our people a proud one. To do so, we have to have more cooperation and greater communication at all levels.”
More platitudes for the Guyanese people! Donald, please understand that the Guyanese people have lost faith in you, your message and party. They look to new leadership.
Sugar must diversify. Guyana must produce what the world market demands at a fair and competitive price.
The time has come to say: Enough is enough. Stop all the corruption with immediate effect. All the on going works taking place across the country is only happening just so that three quarters of the stipulated expenditure is siphoned off in bribes to nearly every one in the system, from top to bottom. Thus, nothing much is left for whatever is supposed to be constructed. That is why the Skeldon Factory ate away itself in less that a year.
On the other hand, Guyanese were stuck with Burnham, who had to confront elections. Hold free and fair elections and guarantee himself being kicked out, like the stark reality his present predecessors-now-successors are grappling with. And who has emerged on top of all of this, unable to bring order out of the mess? And there is talk of continuing the masquerade dance with ‘The Donald’ in 2011. We have to be a brainless nation to allow that to happen.
Guyanese must make a quantum break from the past and gave the country a chance to breathe a life of providing for its wondering flock, scattered to all nooks and crannies of the globe. These “twelve tribes of Guyana” want to come home and contribute with what they have accumulated in foreign lands. But they will not come back under the current dispensation in place, nor of those waiting in the wings, of recent vintage. Guyana needs a newer, untried, but promising set of politicians who can deliver in the shortest time – those who have demonstrated their difference from the last two regimes in power. Five years is the time frame to put in place a revival of the nation and it can be achieved with the vision and commitment.
The party with that vision, commitment and personnel is the Alliance For Change (AFC) under Khemraj Ramjattan, Raphael Trotman and Sheila Holder. There are many more in the wings and in the Diaspora. Five years! And Guyana will have the chance to become sugar cane sweet, once again for all it hopeful, expectant people. Take my word for it.
Lionel Peters

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