By Orville Williams
Questions are still being asked about the payment of millions of dollars owed in severance to former employees of the Jolly Beach Resort as the government continues efforts to reopen the hotel for the upcoming winter tourism season.
More than two years after the once-thriving resort closed its doors, hundreds of former workers are collectively owed more than EC$7 million in outstanding pay and severance.
The government has since been working to secure new investment for the property and announced recently that it has reached an agreement with leisure company, Apple Vacations.
Hotelier Rob Barrett was touted as a potential investor prior to that deal, but pulled out around two months ago.
Work is said to be underway to have the hotel possibly reopened by December and the government has pledged to ensure the former workers are paid; it even said it would put forward around EC$3 million as a partial payment.
Despite that pronouncement in early July, it appears the workers will have to continue to wait, almost indefinitely, based on word from Minister Dean Jonas during yesterday’s post-Cabinet media briefing.
“There [are] a lot of issues to be settled where Jolly Beach is concerned. The matter is in court actually, [and] it’s not as simple as we just put the money up and all these sorts of things.
“The previous owners took the government to court over the matter and so we have to sort out a whole lot of issues, the legal matters and all the other matters, who all are owed.
“We’re working on it very feverishly, and tentatively, we’re looking at getting all of these matters sorted out, but we can’t predict what the court is going to do and the time that the court is going to take to decide on the matter,” Jonas said.
Following those comments, Observer reached out to the Antigua and Barbuda Workers Union (ABWU) – which is representing the Jolly Beach workers – for its response.
Deputy General Secretary Chester Hughes was asked whether he believes the delay in payment is actually due to the court process.
“No, I don’t, because if they wanted to do it, they would have done it and then whatever has to be done after the court process is deducted from those monies.
“If it’s a situation where they truly felt that these workers – who have been suffering for some time now – really deserve this money, they would have gone out and gotten it for the workers. But, you know what? They’re playing politics with it and they accuse us of playing politics,” Hughes said.
The union official told Observer further that, despite several pleas for updates on the situation, the government has continuously failed to speak to either the union or the workers themselves.
“We’ve heard absolutely nothing official from the government; all we’ve been hearing is what comes through the media houses. We’ve appealed to government on several occasions, if they don’t want to talk to the [ABWU], at least call a meeting with the workers at Perry Bay and tell them what the plans are.
“They pledged this $3 million weeks ago and up until now they have not communicated that to us in writing, they have not said anything to us as the workers’ representative, not even to call the workers and say something to them officially,” Hughes said.
And though the potential reopening of the hotel is great news for the tourism sector, Hughes stressed that more importance should be placed on the plight of workers – many of whom are still struggling financially.
“Since this situation with Jolly Beach, we’ve seen persons who have had to go into the bank and their homes have been placed up for sale. We’ve had at least four employees who we know have died and have not received any of their monies.
“There [are] so many different untold stories of suffering by these employees of Jolly Beach who would have put their all into this property and, today, are fighting to get something that is rightfully theirs … to treat them like this is very much not right,” he added.
During the media briefing yesterday, Minister Jonas assured that for those former resort workers who died before receiving any payments, the owed monies would be passed on to their estate.