By: Haddy Touray
A group of bakery workers in Sinchu Alagie, Sinchu Baliya, Kunkuja Keitaya and Wellingara are demanding government intervention for enhanced working conditions and wages as they continue to be “overworked and underpaid”.
The representatives of the aggrieved bakery workers, who spoke with this medium, decried poor working conditions and non-compliance of the law such as the “failure” of bakery owners in providing employment letters and ensuring payment of better salaries, social security contributions and income tax. They also said the bakery owners have not been sensitive to the safety of their staff as they [staff] lacked safety kits, adding that the employers cared less about the health of staff.
The reps. said more than 400 youths, mostly Gambians are working under tough conditions, noting that most of the bakery owners either hailed from Guinean Conakry or Senegal.
“We are appealing to the Government, through the Ministry of Trade, to intervene on our behalf by engaging our employers to improve our working conditions. Most of the bakery workers remain casual workers for years, leaving them and their families vulnerable,” bakery worker Amadou Bah revealed to this medium. “We are calling on the authorities to engage our employers to ensure we enjoy job security. Many Gambian youths are now taking up bakery jobs, but many are quitting because the industry is not regularized.”
Another bakery worker Alagie Kandeh called for increased salaries, noting that salaries paid to bakery workers are among the lowest in the country, rendering them miserable as they could not adequately take care of their families’ basic needs.
He observed that time and time again, bakery owners increase the prices of bread as well as payment of bread suppliers but never think of increasing the salaries of their employees, adding that if the status quo is not addressed, bakery workers in the Old Yundum general area will call for a massive strike that will hinder the production of bread around that neck of the wood and beyond.
Yahya Dambelleh, also a Gambian bakery worker, opined that the Government should seriously look into the working conditions of bakery workers, arguing that Government is always focusing on the welfare of bakery owners but has never considered the welfare of the bakery workers the majority of whom, he said, comprised of Gambian youths.
According to him, at least 95% of bakery workers is without formal employment letter, social security, income tax or medical cover and protection, noting that most of the workers go through very difficult times in taking care of their children’s school and medical bills as well as providing nutritious food for their families.
Dambelleh also called on the Ministry of Youths to assist the huge numbers of Gambian youth, working in the bakery sector, noting that most of them have completed their basic and secondary education but lacked finances to pursue their academic dreams at the tertiary level.
