Maths, Morality, and the Myth of GAWU’s Defense of Sugar

Dear Editor,

When Seepaul Narine of GAWU takes to the press to lambast the Village Voice for its sober reportage, the public should pause — not out of respect, but out of incredulity. Mr. Narine’s furious defence of the sugar industry might read like righteous indignation, but peel back the rhetoric and you will find something far less noble: a man defending his own paycheck, not a nation’s lifeline.

Let’s start with the numbers — since the “maths,” unlike political spin, do not lie. GuySuCo continues to haemorrhage billions annually, kept afloat by taxpayer subventions that could have revitalised entire regions through diversification. From 2020 to 2025 alone, more than $70 billion was pumped into a sector that, by its own production data, delivers less sugar today than it did two decades ago. Cost of production hovers around $100,000 per tonne, while world prices barely reach half that. The deficit is not narrowing; it’s widening.

That’s not “revitalisation.” It’s dependency on life support.

Yet here comes Mr. Narine to tell the Guyanese people that sugar is “vital.” Vital to whom? To the small band of union executives whose salaries depend on the industry’s continued state financing? To the political actors who see sugar workers not as strategic partners in diversification but as a captive voting bloc to be appeased with nostalgia and subsidies? That’s not advocacy — that’s economic opportunism dressed up as solidarity.

Ethically, the hypocrisy is glaring. The same union leadership that claims to fight for worker dignity seems perfectly content to tether its members to a sinking ship, rather than fight for their retraining, reskilling, and redeployment into sustainable, higher-value industries. The International Labour Organisation’s own post-closure studies showed that the path forward was diversification, not resuscitating a corpse. But diversification doesn’t preserve union dues or executive salaries, does it?

And then there is the pathos — the human cost Mr. Narine evokes with selective memory. He paints closures as cruelty, but says nothing of the cruelty of false hope — of telling thousands that if only the government keeps feeding a failing model, prosperity will return. The real betrayal is not of 2015–2020. It’s the betrayal of 2020–2026, when billions more have been spent, and the workers are still poor, their communities still struggling, and their union still clutching at the same failed narrative.

So yes, the Village Voice got it right. Sugar, as it stands, is not vital to Guyana’s development; it is vital only to those whose livelihoods depend on pretending it still is. The Voice of the People speaks through data, not dogma. And the data has been speaking for years. Only those with a personal net fear to hear it.

No matter how much the powerbrokers spin and varnish the narrative to suit their agendas, the stark reality refuses to budge—the sugar industry is sinking. To keep workers tethered to this sinking ship is not compassion; it is cruelty. It is a crude display of self‑preservation masquerading as advocacy, a choice to prioritise personal power and political convenience over human livelihood. That is not merely economic folly; it is a moral and ethical crime.