The recent three-day general strike in the sugar industry, called by the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU), protesting the delay by the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) in initiating wage talks, signals a return to militancy of Guyana’s largest and most influential trade union. GAWU’s history of militancy dates from the 1940s when, under another name, it came under the influence of militants who later became leaders of the PPP. GAWU’s gruelling, thirty-year struggle for recognition, which followed an epic strike in two parts in 1977, defined it as a leader and symbol of working class struggle for justice, independence and democracy.
This militancy declined dramatically from 1992 onwards when the PPP/C was first elected to office. During
