Society crying out for better standard of living –Freddie Kissoon

guyana chronicle

October 12, 2015

SOCIAL activist Freddie Kissoon is calling on the government to significantly improve the standard of living here by offering more attractive remuneration packages. He also feels that age 55 is much too early for public servants to retire.He made these suggestions during a hearing of the Public Service Commission of Inquiry (CoI) on Tuesday last at the Public Service Department of the Ministry of the Presidency.

Before CoI Chairman Professor Harold Lutchman and Commissioners Sandra Jones and Samuel Goolsarran, Kissoon testified that the work of public servants must be recognised and the level of their salaries must be updated.

“If we’re going to get a credible Public Service, and if we’re going to recognise their work, then those salaries have to be civilised ones. We need to have immense elevation in public servants’ salaries. Just take a look at how they live,” Kissoon declared.

Kissoon related that in other countries, civil servants and university lecturers are among the most respected groups, and they live fairly comfortable lifestyles. They live in ways strange to Guyanese public servants.

“Once you leave these shores and you go to any society that is not in civil war, a society that is fairly well structured and has a fair economy, two of the most respected and prestigious sectors of the society are civil servants and academics,” he said.

“I remember an administrative officer in one of the faculties at UWI (University of the West Indies) came here to buy furniture. An administrative officer in any one of the UG (University of Guyana) faculties would have to buy Chinese-made furniture with the incomes they get,” he pointed out.

Public service is a vital element in any country, he testified, and even though public servants in Guyana are not properly compensated, every aspect of the country’s economy depends on them.

“A society is held together by the Public Service. Every paper that is signed to own a house, to invest, to buy a cow, to buy a cutlass, to use it… you trace this paper trail, and it goes back to people who run the society and keep it going, the public servant… You go to GRA (Guyana Revenue authority) and public servants are in that place without a proper air condition. And we go to them to get our licence. They sit from nine to five, and examine their payments.”

Kissoon attributes the loss of credibility and original status of the public sector to the implementation of the structural adjustment programme by the late President Desmond Hoyte. This, according to him, shifted emphasis to other sectors of the economy, and has defunded the main one.

“I honestly think it began with the structural adjustment programme of President Desmond Hoyte. That programme nearly degutted the public sector…because it shifted emphasis to other sectors; the public sector was defunded [and] the rate of exchange was almost tripled.

“…public servants who were income-earners woke up a morning under structural adjustment, or what you call the ERP (Economic Recovery Programme), and found that the five million dollars that they had in the bank, they only had two now…structural adjustment went too far, and it hurt seriously public service more than any other sector of this country.”

Kissoon said he is shocked at the post-retirement state of some prominent retired public servants who had dedicated their lives to serving Guyana. He was especially hurt when, one afternoon, he was walking in the National Park and met a respected retired teacher at Bishops High School, whose appearance was that of a homeless woman. A conversation with her saddened him after she revealed the amount of her pension to him.

He said that at another time, he caught up with a retired University of Guyana (UG) Vice Chancellor (VC), who is the holder of a PHD in Chemistry and is now living on a $6,000 monthly pension.

“If I tell you my pension, the next thing I’d ask you is for some help,” he said, inciting laughter at the hearings.

RETIREMENT AGE The former UG lecturer said the retirement age of 55 does not allow senior public servants the freedom to enjoy their after-retirement lives.

“Some of my colleagues [fellow lecturers] left [after retirement] and went to other universities after. And when they came back here, it was as if in those years they earned more at those universities than for the 30 years they worked at UG,” he said.

“People work very hard, and you now have to liberate their spirit,” he said, adding that the concept of retirement is to live without the rigors of everyday employment, but to still live well. “People live very badly, and you’re going to retire them with what kind of income?” Kissoon asked.

Kissoon also warned the CoI and the government that society will not forgive them if they do not ensure a better life for public servants.

“In all academic seriousness, this society cries out for some recognition in meaningful ways of the public servant; and the society, this commission and this government will not be forgiven by history if, in the next five years — until we reach the next election — if there is not extensive improvement in the all-round life of public servants,” he warned.

By Shauna Jemmott