Opposition lambastes Gov’t for recruiting foreign nurses, says it proves strategy to replace local workers

Recent move by the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Government to recruit hundreds of nurses from Bangladesh is not sitting well with the A Partnership of National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC).  In a blistering critique of the decision the Opposition, at its Thursday’s press conference, said recruitment of these workers clearly testifies to Government’s continued reluctance to provide the necessary wages and salaries and working conditions to retain local healthcare workers.

“It is evident that the government intends to ensure that Guyanese healthcare workers, teachers and all public servants continue to live in poverty. This is so because while the government says that the Guyanese workers should wait until 2027 for them to have a livable income, the government is seeking to give foreign workers a better salary, and concomitantly, a better way of life than Guyanese.”

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed Government authorised a recruiting agency to hire 500 Bangladeshi healthcare workers for both the private and public sectors.

In the face of competing realities, the Opposition said Guyanese should note the following.

“1) The salaries and benefits being offered the foreign workers are substantially higher than for equivalent Guyanese workers in the health care system. This is a slap in the face of our hardworking Guyanese workers by the PPP government.

“2) The use of work contracts to recruit public servants from other countries is a devious stratagem by the PPP to suppress wages and benefits for local workers as well. Under the PPP, this stratagem foreign recruitment of workers will likely spread to the education system and the wider public service. Guyanese workers will end up being second-class workers in their own country,

“and 3) the government is trying to secretly introduce foreigners into our society, with total disregard of the views and concerns of the people of Guyana.”

It’s the Opposition’s view the choice of Bangladeshi and Sri Lankan workers is deliberate since as citizens from the Commonwealth, in one year these migrants will become eligible to vote in Guyana. Consequently, this is a clear attempt by the PPP regime to use migrants to boost its fading popularity in its traditional strongholds.

Flaying Government for recruiting foreign nurses whilst its shuttered the Charles Rosa Nursing School in Linden, the Opposition stated there are many young people who can be trained to become health workers. However, the PPP strategy seems to be to underpay health workers and public servants generally, leave them in poor working conditions and to reduce the training of Guyanese to fill these positions, the coalition pointed out.

According to the APNU+AFC, the PPP Government is clearly creating the conditions for health workers and public servants to migrate so that they can replace them with foreigners who they are likely to exercise control over. Calling on the government to desist from this destructive strategy, the coalition wants to see conditions created that are conducive to Guyanese wanting to be health workers and public servants and remain in Guyana.

To the end the APNU+AFC has proposed the undermentioned as a way forward:

“1)    Ensure the government and the trade unions agree to a multi-year pay package for healthcare workers, teachers and other public servants through collective bargaining.

“2)   Table a policy paper on immigration and migration in the National Assembly for scrutiny, discussion and a consensual approach to these issues.

“3)   The government must provide reliable data on the number of migrants and foreign workers in Guyana.

“4)   Restore the law as it relates to the issuance of birth certificates so as to ensure transparency, accountability and the security of the Guyanese society and end the present approach in which anyone can sign a document making questionable characters eligible voters.”

The coalition also highlighted the need for a proper system of making migrants eligible to vote in Guyana. “Migrants’ presence in Guyana, if not properly handled, has serious implications for the country’s political stability and social cohesion. It must be recalled that we have a territorial controversy with Venezuela and therefore we have to be security conscious at this stage.”

According to the APNU+AFC, the question of importing migrants takes on even greater proportions when it is noted that Vice President Jagdeo has been accused of bribery and corruption and is a key Actor in the decisions of the government. “Migrants’ importation is teemed with potential for corruption and political manipulation.”