Minimum wage worker to get $4,900 increase in oil-rich Guyana

Nov 19, 2021 News

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Kaieteur News – In a country with one of the world’s largest oil reserves, the Irfaan Ali Government on Thursday announced a mere seven percent, across-the-board salary increase for public servants, retroactive from January 2021.
This comes even after the state workers did not get an increase in salary last year. When analysed against the rising cost of living, which Ali acknowledged last week, many public servants saw the announcement as a slap in the face and many took to social media on Thursday venting their displeasure.

Making the announcement on behalf of the Government was Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh. The announcement came on Thursday afternoon as thousands of public servants were glued to their phones and computer screens, in anticipation of a substantive increase, since Government had promised a whopping 50 percent increase to their salaries, during their Elections Campaign only last year. Nevertheless, the seven percent raise will be reflected in salaries payable by December 2021.

“I am pleased to announce now that your Government will be paying an across-the-board increase of seven percent to public servants, teachers, members of the disciplined services, constitutional office holders, as well as government pensioners. This increase will be granted retroactively to 1 January 2021, and work will start immediately to ensure that it is processed and paid to eligible employees together with their December salary and in time for the festive Christmas season,” the Minister explained.

It must be noted that a Public Servant currently earning $70,000 in Guyana will receive a $4,900 increase, before taxes, while a Minister of the Government earning $869,000 will receive an increase of $60,830 to their monthly salaries. Leading up to his announcement, the Minister reminded Guyanese of all the money spent this year to “directly improve” the disposable household income.

He said a COVID-19 cash grant of $25,000 per household was distributed, resulting in over $7.5 billion distributed to families across all ten Regions. Year-end bonuses totaling $1 billion was paid in December 2020 to frontline workers in the health sector and the disciplined services, while a one-off payment of $25,000 was made to all public sector employees in December 2020, placing $2 billion in the hands of close to 60,000 employees, the Minister stated.

He was also keen to note that the Government facilitated an increase in the monthly old-age pension from $20,500 to $25,000, amounting to some $4 billion this year to seniors. Singh also made mention of the increase in public assistance from $9,000 to $12,000 monthly, totaling $500 million and the one-off grant of $25,000 to all old age pensioners, public assistance recipients, and persons living with disabilities which benefitted some 90,000 persons to the tune of $2.2 billion, along with $200 million of electricity credits provided to the most vulnerable households.

Lastly, the Finance Minister reminded of the restoration of the ‘Because We Care’ cash grants to the parents of schoolchildren, increasing the amount for each child to $19,000 and extending the programme to children attending private schools. In total, this provided some $3.6 billion of cash transfers to the parents of 192,000 schoolchildren.

Bonus for Frontline workers

In addition to the pay hike for public servants, frontline workers are poised to receive an additional bonus, the Minister announced. In fact, some $400 million has been set aside for a “special 2021 payout to be made to frontline workers in the health sector who have continued to face extenuating circumstances in the daily discharge of their duties” Singh related. Details pertaining to the payout are yet to be announced. The Minister would only say that it will be made to eligible employees before the end of December 2021.

Anomalies

During his statement, Dr. Singh said that the Government has recognised “the existence of a number of anomalies and disparities across positions, within the public service salary scales, as a result of which there are marked inconsistencies across the pay, received by persons holding similar qualifications, but occupying different posts, depending on the agency in which they work, the post to which they are appointed, and the salary scale in which their post is classified”.

He explained, in some cases, public servants with a specific degree may be earning $120,000 in one agency while a graduate with identical qualifications is earning $190,000 in another agency. “Government will be taking steps next year to reduce these inconsistencies, by making suitable adjustments to salaries in order to improve the parity and consistency with which persons with comparable qualifications are paid. Provision will be made for this in Budget 2022,” he pointed out.

 

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