Staff and students are awaiting response from the school

Jul 27, 2016 Letters

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Dear Editor,
As authorities of the Guyana School of Agriculture ponder on a response, several past and present staff and students are eagerly awaiting that precious response. Many have opined that the best response will be Mr. John, your information is true and accurate and whoever fed you such information has done a pretty good job and must be commended since it clearly represented what has been happening for years.
Mr. Editor, while some may be questioning the authenticity of my letters, it would be prudent for one to stop for a few seconds and try to understand a few things. They should try to answer the following questions from a commonsense point of view.
These questions are: Would the writer be so skillful to fabricate so many things about the institution? Would it be just a mere coincidence that all the information the writer has put forward is so accurate?
I’ll save other questions for a later date but while persons may still be pondering, I would like to submit that if a poll is taken randomly of students and staff that have been to the institution between 2004 to present you will come up with a 85 — 95% of same being mistreated, and I’m being light on the numbers here.
Mr. Editor, this should not be strange to officials in other institutions since persons have been persistent with their complaints and obviously at this point to no avail. The important official of the Ministry of Agriculture (don’t want to call his name at this point, he already in hot water waiting to be plucked) is well aware of what has been going on since several students have gone with their parents crying to him about the mistreatment, and also the fact that they have been expelled for simple infringements just because a certain person didn’t like them.
Several staff members have also gone to the ministry and levied complaints but at least he listened; he did nothing further. Various security guards at the Ministry of Agriculture gate can attest to the fact that persons have gone in to the ministry crying and leaving either crying more or just with a dejected face. The guards can attest since at the gate you are not allowed in the compound unless you state your name and whom you are going to.
Could you imagine a board member walking around and using expletives (cussing up) because he wants things to go his way? Oh, he left two disciples, one mishandles even senior staff. It’s his way or the highway. The other disciple is a former military man. It is understood that in the military all sorts of expletives are used to get subordinate workers to comply with certain instructions even though this is unacceptable but could you imagine working at an institution (school) that prohibits students from cursing (using expletives) and staff and students are constantly being cussed out by this former military man? What is the institution turning to? I understand that students if caught, they are disciplined, what should be the situation when a senior staff is caught cussing down students? Talk about double standards.
I was informed that only some workers were paid gratuity on Friday July 22, 2016. The others were not paid since they were not given a contract to sign and the gratuity received by the one set would have been the same from last year, no increase again. I am also reliably informed that the workers would have voted regarding being placed on contract and being placed on a pensionable establishment. The majority of the workers voted in favor of a contractual arrangement since the pension plan was allowed to fail and they would have lost tremendously.
The voting I understand took place in November or December 2015, giving management enough time to negotiate with the workers and give them a contract in January of 2016 so they can sign and at least get gratuity by the date that was already past. Mr. Editor, I was also informed that nothing was said to the workers even though the board instructed the facilitator to prepare contract and give them to the workers. So these workers that already lost because of the failed pension plan have not received anything for their years of service, are now in a state of not having any gratuity because management did not follow the instructions of the board to give the workers contracts. Does management have the authority to override the board’s decision? How long will these things continue to happen?
Mr. Editor, information has surfaced that the institution is in a financial crisis and looking to cut cost. While cutting cost is a very good thing for anyone in business in this situation, I’m informed it will be detrimental to some workers since it is quite obvious that some will be asked to go home in polite ways and a certain big wig will find frivolous things to fire workers for. That’s a norm so anyone that knows him should not be surprised.
Workers constantly hear about the financial situation whenever they make request for materials to get the job done and when items are delayed they are told that they are inefficient. Because of this, several persons have been brought in to do work that the workers are able to do and paid substantially higher rates, while the workers sometimes have to assist or correct faults from the work that would have been done.
Paul John

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