OPINION: Pay proposals for teachers incremental and insulting

Last Updated on Saturday, 10 August 2024, 21:10 by Writer

by GHK Lall

The strike of public school teachers has torn another gaping hole in the fabric of Guyana. The ancient tug-of-war between politics and clean purposes, race and fairness, has been given yet another lease on life. A distressing local existence is what Guyanese have always known. Teachers have endured a torrid time, and their traumas continue without letup. When is the last time that any citizen in this country, in this grand new era has heard anything changing by 6%? It could be called the opening gambit, if this were a game of chess. It is life, and a hard one that no one should ever mistake for a game. If it is a game, then it is one that Guyanese have lost, regardless of their seasons. In a time of lavish, exuberant abundance, teachers are treated to the scrap of 6% that is touted as a hospitable greeting. Somebody must be mad, and I know that it could not be me.

There was 6% from the government to start the ball. As lowballs go, there are few lower. A finger poked in the eye with an insulting grin as company. Take that and do what pleases. The teachers found no such element in the 6% that the PPP Government laid so insolently on the table. By way of an aside, if my favorite Venezuelan, Nicolás Maduro, could describe Guyana’s head of state with that exact word and not a peep came out of his people, then describing the government’s paltry 6% offer as insolent should meet with no resistance. Surely, I have a little higher standing in PPP land than Maduro.

From the bottom-of-the barrel 6%, some sense of sanity took charge in the government, and its people were astonished to discover that they could count higher. The new beauty from the PPP was 7.5%. From my perspective, that of a clinical observer, the bright, new 7.5% is 6% with a pale ribbon affixed. Something tells me that the members in some subgroup of political schemers in the PPP Government congratulated themselves for their 7.5% pay increase extravagance. Apparently, the Guyana Teachers Union (GTU) didn’t take that rosy view of offer number two. I think that the GTU saw the initial 6% for what it was. Nothing but embalming fluid to pretty up a messy situation. Just like the proposed 6% hike that was dead on arrival, the government brain trust and bean counters had to know that 7.5% had no life to it, just another false start. The question is how many iterations of this form of creeping incrementalism from the government? How many more grudging, dripping, advancing percentages as carrot and rattrap for Guyana’s teachers? How many more of these leadership ploys is the president, vice president, and the man with responsibility for the nation’s money prepared to be part of what now possesses all the attributes of a full-fledged charade? Thanks for the rare transparency, Mr. President. And for how long?

Incidentally, the well-initialed Dr. A.K. Singh’s money responsibility is a job I could accept, considering the free-for-all environment and culture. Also, with initials like those, is he some incarnation of a heartless banker with those money percentages of his? Yeah, curiosity kills cats like me. Though I digress, the point is simple: free up the money, brother, for the teachers of Guyana. I am sure that some could be found hidden away in many places, especially with oil returns for Guyana projected to hit the ceiling, then busting through it. It was the man who knew much, Bharrat Jagdeo, who himself said so, not I. Maximization of return was the term of art that the Americans drilled into his skull. Like the loyal soldier to foreign interests that he has proven to be, he was only too happy to deliver the good news. Now his government must deliver. The teachers would prefer that it is more frontloaded than backloaded. Just let all the numbers add up and be binding on all parties.

Having tested the waters twice (6%, then 7.5%), the PPP Government wisemen up the ante to 9%, was what I heard, and is getting closer to the real starting point. It is obvious that the GTU is not hearing as well: 9% is no good. Get that sucker off the table, go back to the drawing board, was its subdued public response. It is left to the imagination relative to what is happening behind closed doors. I detect a growing impatience with this nickel-and-dime approach taken by the government. A low temp start (6%), then the first 1.5% step up, then another 1.5% to sweeten the pot. The pot has much more sweetening to make it right. I speak for myself, not the GTU. I think another 3% with incentives thrown in as a token of serious intentions could stir some reasoned reception in the GTU corner. At the current 1.5% snail crawl, there could be two more rounds before matters settle into some mutually tranquil state. Or they deteriorate with claims and counterclaims about who is operating in good faith, and who is about the opposite.

For its part, the PPP Government could assert that it improved the pay increase pot by 50% (6% to 9%). On its own behalf, the GTU could point to all the years surrendered from a constructive bargaining mindset to get a fair deal done, and nothing but one insult after another offer from the government—three in a row—hurled in its face. All the pieces considering, I think that the PPP Government had to begin the bargaining in the double-digits range. It started out with a half, maybe even as much as a third, of where it should have been. Teachers, parents, and citizens now wait on the government. Be sensible, manage expectations is my advice. Know the territory. Know the parties. Know the norms.