With general elections looming, the working class was urged to focus on issues affecting their rights as the GTUC held its annual Labour Day event at the Critchlow Labour College, Woolford Avenue yesterday.
Dozens of workers from across the country represented by unions including the Guyana Public Service Union (GPSU), converged at the venue where President of the Guyana Trades Union Congress,Norris Witter called for this year’s regional and general elections climate to be influenced by a “new form of politics”. It was the first time in recent years that the GPSU had showed up at CLC following a rift with the GTUC. As in recent years, the GTUC and its rival, the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Guyana held separate observances.
While addressing a gathering which included PNCR Leader, Robert Corbin, Presidential Candidate of the party David Granger and Peter Ramsaroop of the Guyana People’s Partnership among others, Witter said that the “system” which should be used by politicians during the campaign period should be free from the race-based model which he noted, must go.
He said that there is need for a change in the system of politics where historically winners and losers are segregated following the elections and which he noted has historically seen ethnic divisions coinciding with political parties. He said too that a new system of governance must be inculcated which will be free of the political oligarchs “living at Pradoville-styled” housing areas while the masses “live in squalor and abject poverty”.
Witter called for the government which will run the affairs of the nation following this year’s elections to implement a principled system of governance, one free of corruption, and he added that presently those public servants who take “principled” positions are punished for their actions while those committing unprincipled acts are rewarded.
He called on supporters of the movement to vote for, “any party but the one that makes people progressively poorer”, adding that there is need for a government which “will not misuse state property and steal public funds”.
He noted too that there is need for a government, “which will not waste money on a one laptop gimmick”, but rather invest in the education of the citizenry from nursery to the tertiary level.
Being a national movement geared at protecting and fighting for the rights of the workforce, Witter noted that the GTUC has been committed to fighting the “struggle” which confronts the body, noting that its major opponent is of a political nature. He called on the working class to identify and focus on the issues affecting their rights as the general election nears.
Recommit
General Secretary of the GTUC, Lincoln Lewis, called on Guyanese to recommit to the struggle for social and economic justice which was orchestrated by the earlier generations.
He said that the events of today’s society have created an opportune moment, “to assess the distance travelled, how much has been achieved, how much we have lost, and what it requires to achieve the creation of a just society.”
Lewis said that some 106 years after Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow staged the first organised workers’ struggle for economic and social justice, thereby laying the groundwork for a succession of events to realize improved conditions in the workplace and wider society, such advancement can no longer be taken for granted.
He said that for Critchlow and the labour community the battle could not only be fought in the workplace, but wherever injustice existed.
He said that presently, poverty abounds, “and its presence is not only felt in a squalid environment but also when persons have to pinch in order to buy or rely on overseas assistance to pay for basic goods and services.”
He added that, “disposable income is being eroded with inflation and draconian taxes, making the most essential of items a luxury.”
Lewis argued that with the average minimum wage being $34,000 per month, the inflation rate being 5%, VAT being 16% percent and PAYE being 33.3%, “it is impossible for workers to achieve self development and the nation to emerge from poverty and deprivation.”
He said that such economic straits have seen Guyanese being more dependent on assistance from overseas to provide basic amenities which through their jobs, they should be able to achieve.
Jettisoned
In the year 2000, Lewis said that a proposal was submitted to the government for a self-sustaining housing development project to be undertaken on the Linden/Soesdyke Highway, but he noted that the plan was “frustrated and jettisoned” by the administration. He said that the aim of the project was to generate employment and make use of the home-owners’ labour but the proposal remains on the backburner of government plans.
Lewis called on workers and the citizenry, “to stand up and demand what is rightly theirs”, and he called on workers to intensify and unite around the struggle for a common good.
Meantime, Kathleen Fowler, a representative of the Women’s Advisory Council (WAC), an arm of the GTUC, called on the female workforce to be properly recognized.
As she questioned whether “we have anything to smile about”, Fowler pointed to the conditions under which sections of the female workforce, including vendors and security guards are made to work, noting that the female gender continues to face challenges in their every-day life.
She listed sexual harassment, discrimination, victimisation and domestic violence as key issues affecting the female gender in today’s society. As regards domestic violence, she noted that even as the world celebrated International Women’s Day recently, “we still see our women being dragged and murdered”.
Fowler called on women not to “bargain” their future “to a love life”, but rather place their future and the well-being of their children at the forefront. She noted too that the female workforce must remain resiliently committed to the struggles which confronts it and called on workers to unite in order to secure economic prosperity.
During yesterday’s event, a minute of silence was observed at the sudden passing of Jean Smith, a veteran trade unionist and member of the WAC. Smith, who passed away yesterday morning, had served the GTUC as a representative of the WAC for decades and was a former secretary of the latter body.
