Dear Editor,
Please grant us space in your publication to highlight the following as regards the sugar workers of the now closed L.B.I. sugar factory.
We the sugar workers of the berbice sugar estates wish to register our dismay and disgust as to how our colleagues at the closed L.B.I, sugar factory were and are still being treated.
We had the fortune to meet a few of these sugar workers at the P.P.P rally at Kitty but after hearing their story we will definitely put on hold/review any support for the Donald Ramotar Presidency, he being the key architect as a director on the GuySuCo Board for their predicament and plight.
We were following closely the saga of the Diamond workers, until the settlement through the
intervention of President Jagdeo, all of whom who finally received their severance pay which they truly earn and deserve.
However after workers at L.B.I, were given about one month’s notice they were relegated and shunted like cattle to Enmore where you now have a bloated staff which that entity cannot now sustain because of poor production levels.
It currently warrants an injection of millions of dollars from the state to keep Enmore afloat to sustain the Enmore/LBI location.
However before L.B.I’s, closure most of the workers there should have been retrained in whatever fields of endeavour they chose at the state’s expense and severance paid to those who desired it. A needs assessment ought to have been carried out.
We sincerely urge the Donald Ramotar camp to urgently review this by assiduously ensuring the engagement of these L.B.I workers to bring a rectification to this process as it hangs as a dark cloud over all our heads. It’s definitely not too late as we in Berbice monitor this situation closely.
We in Berbice were also reliably informed that a few L.B.I factory workers had applied months ago for their just severance pay similar to the Diamond workers and similarly the process has been stymied due to heavy bureaucratic red tape.
We urge all sugar and non sugar workers of Berbice and Demerara to take note and give these workers their solidarity and let them receive what is due to them and stop state adventurism against poor workers.
Yours faithfully,
D. Appanah
R. Dindyal
H. Moriah
C. Persaud
