The Working Class President
September 16, 2014, By KNews, Filed Under Features/Columnists, Peeping Tom, Source - Kaieteur News
You cannot please the Guyanese people.
Each afternoon, hundreds of Guyanese are left stranded for hours at our bus parks and along the bus routes. Workers for example, who work in the center of the city, walk as far as Carifesta Avenue at the northern extremity of the city in order to catch the East Coast buses before they enter in the city. All along Camp Street, snaking into North Road and right to the East Coast Bus Park, hundreds line up each afternoon waiting for hours to get home. It is the same for commuters to areas along the West Bank of Demerara. They line up for hours along Lombard Street waiting for transportation to get across the bridge and get home.
One year ago, the government signaled its concern about this state of affairs. One year ago the government gave notice that it intended to offer concessions to the private sector to bring in large buses to address this situation. Nothing has happened.
The private bus owners did not take up the offer. The mini bus operators continued with their merry old ways. Some of them made one trip from 4.30 and went home. They were not concerned by the fact that the very persons whom their livelihood and profits depended on were being left stranded on the road. This was selfish capitalism at its best.
There are of course some challenges faced by the mini bus operators. For example, the heavy traffic leading to the Harbour Bridge and the slow pace of this traffic in the afternoons, mean that it is extremely difficult for some of these buses headed to as far as Parika to make two trips after 4. 30 pm. That is a situation over which some mini bus operators have no control. But those aside, gross insensitivity towards the plight of workers were shown by the private transportation operators.
They had more than a year to organize themselves to come up with a solution and do something about this problem. After all, the President himself has signaled that he was prepared to intervene in the interests of the workers.
He has now. The government has announced that contracted big buses will be deployed, no doubt as sweepers, to pick up those commuters who are left stranded for hours at the car park. The service will be free.
This is wonderful news which shows the working class credentials of Donald Ramotar. It is a measure that will attract opposition. Already persons are hinting that it is a service that will destroy the mini bus operations. It will not because all that is being done is to fill a gap which is not being filled at the moment by the mini bus operators. The new service is not taking away business from the private mini buses. It is only picking up those who would be left behind by these very mini buses.
There will be attempts to destroy this initiative by the government. As part of this campaign, all manner of motives will be attributed to the government. There has already been the suggestion that this is all part of its preparation for elections. It may well be, but guess what? This service is a response to the needs of the people and if the government wishes to milk some political currency from it, what can be so obscene about that.
Donald Ramotar must be commended for this move. It is a working class measure because those who line up for hours each afternoon waiting for transportation to get home are those from the working class who do not own their own cars or buses. Many of them are young people now joining the workforce. Many of them are nurses. Many of them are mothers with families. This measure will be a God-send for them. They should support Donald Ramotar on this one and tell the critics where to put their objections.
Even if he secures a second term and a parliamentary majority in that second term, Donald Ramotar is not going to see during his presidential tenure the completion of the Amalia Falls Hydroelectric Power Station.
The construction of that facility will take more than five years and therefore even if government is able to secure the financing from the Consolidated Fund or even if it is able to acquire one hundred per cent private sector funding for the venture, something that it is believed Ramotar is pursuing vigorously, this flagship project will not be completed under Ramotar’s presidency.
But that project was always going to be about the legacy of Bharrat Jagdeo. It was a project conceived under Jagdeo and therefore it was always going to be about him. The transportation problem also existed under Jagdeo but what did he do about it?
Donald Ramotar on the other hand has other priorities. They are not about building hotels and specialty hospitals. They are about ensuring that workers are not robbed and exploited. He has ensured that the weakest of workers are protected by passing legislation for a forty hour work week. All work done in excess of that attracts overtime.
Now he has moved towards helping workers to get home earlier by providing this free service to aid the overall transportation sector. By these two measures alone, he has shown his commitment to the workers.
Source -- http://www.kaieteurnewsonline....ing-class-president/