Issues affecting sugar not the fault of APNU/AFC Govt

…Coalition members say during protest against PPP officials in Berbice

Members of the coalition A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) on Wednesday picketed the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) as it held meetings in Berbice with displaced sugar workers.
The coalition members had gone to Edinburgh hoping to confront Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo but he was not there. Nevertheless, they then assembled at Angoy’s Avenue where another meeting was scheduled to be held in order to disrupt the meeting there which they eventually were successful in doing.

This eventually led to a confrontation between the protesters and some sugar workers, with the Police being called in to control the protesters.
The coalition’s Regional Chairman, Kirk Fraser, said they were not there mainly to picket the main Opposition party but the let people know the truth.
“The closure of the sugar estate is not as a result of the APNU Government but is one which is in keeping with ensuring that the Guyanese people receive value for money. The Government had put G$22 billion into the industry from 2015 to 2017 in which no returns is received from the industry. We cannot allow taxpayers’ money to go down the drain without receiving any financial return,” he posited.
Fraser says whenever the PPP organises a meeting in the region, the coalition will picket them in an attempt to bring clarity to the issue. He said the issues affecting the sugar estates are not the fault of the coalition Government but that of the People’s Progressive Party Administration, which he said, ran the industry into the ground.
“GuySuCo is at present bankrupt and as a result of that the Government would have chipped in to ensure that the worker’s efforts are recognised by giving severance to the workers. If GuySuCo had filed for bankruptcy then the workers would have been on the breadline,” Fraser said.
Executive Member of the People’s National Congress, Barbara Pilgrim, standing on the picket line, told the media that had the Government done what it should have done, workers would have been worse off and devastated.
“When an organisation files for bankruptcy, the first thing that happens is that those who are your creditors are the first persons you have to pay. If that was the case and GuySuCo had to pay all of those that it owes then the worker’s severance would be the last thing that would be paid but because this Government cares for the workers, they are putting up several billion dollars to pay severance,” Pilgrim explained.