Akeel seeks comments from Armstrong, Thomas
By Patrick Denny
Chief Industrial Relations Officer at the Ministry of Labour, Mohamed Akeel, has begun his probe into the claims made by government's representative on the public service pay tribunal that he was excluded from the process. Akeel told Stabroek News yesterday that he had written to tribunal Chairman Dr Aubrey Armstrong and the unions' representative, Professor Clive Thomas, asking for their comments on the claims made by government representative, Bank of Guyana economist, Dr Gobind Ganga. He said that based on their comments, he would determine what his next move would be. Commenting on claims that some of the tribunal records were missing, Akeel said he was not in a position to determine this until all the material was handed over to him by the tribunal's secretary. He said that the records of the tribunal were the property of the Labour Ministry and would form part of its archives. Ganga claimed in a letter to Labour Minister, Dr Henry Jeffrey, that he was unaware of the final award announced by Armstrong, and had been surprised at the quantum of the award announced, alleging that it was made without consulting with him. As a result of this, Akeel was directed by Jeffrey to investigate. The award announced by Armstrong with which Thomas agreed was across-the-board increases of 31.06% for 1999 and 26.67% for 2000. Ganga indicated that when he left the meeting of the tribunal on Sunday, the figures over which he had been in disagreement were 17% and 25%, which was the basis of his minority report. Jeffrey's directive to Akeel was prompted by Ganga's claims, which, if valid, he said, could have serious negative consequences for much of the future work of the Labour Ministry. Meanwhile, General Secretary (ag) of the Guyana Public Service Union, Joseph Brandt, told Stabroek News that his union had been prepared to respect the outcome of the reward whatever it was and he felt the government should do the same. He said that the award has presented a golden opportunity for the government to map out strategies to improve its relations with the union and to work with it to increase the efficiency of the public service. Commenting on reports that the government could move to the courts to challenge the award if there were breaches in the tribunal procedures, Brandt said that the government should think seriously about such moves and it should instead try to ensure that public servants remained at their desks and worked. Brandt hinted that the union had already had calls of support from its members indicating their readiness to take any action to pursue their case. He cautioned that the government must note that it was the rank and file membership which was calling on the union leadership to be militant in the promotion of their interests. The three-man arbitration tribunal was set up to rule on demands by the public service unions for a 40% wage hike for 1999, which sparked off a 55-day strike when government refused to pay more than 4.6 per cent.
|