Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

Joint Trade Union Move­ment (JTUM) leader An­cel Ro­get has cau­tioned that they will leave “no stone un­turn” to sup­port the Gov­ern­ment’s ef­forts in restart­ing the Petrotrin re­fin­ery.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia af­ter ad­dress­ing work­ers at Har­ris Prom­e­nade, San Fer­nan­do, fol­low­ing a May Day march, he said he was con­fi­dent restart­ing the re­fin­ery would trig­ger an eco­nom­ic boost.

Com­ment­ing on Op­po­si­tion MP and for­mer en­er­gy min­is­ter Stu­art Young’s vis­it with Venezuela’s act­ing Pres­i­dent Del­cy Ro­driguez, Ro­get said it was an­oth­er at­tempt to un­der­mine the Gov­ern­ment.

“I just want to warn Stu­art Young, if it is that it is your po­si­tion or am­bi­tion to be­come po­lit­i­cal leader and have a fight with Pen­ny Beck­les and to what­ev­er your am­bi­tions are, leave the Gov­ern­ment alone to con­duct the busi­ness in the in­ter­est of T&T. Do not un­der­mine this Gov­ern­ment.”

He said the unions would not al­low this and were pre­pared to push back against their de­trac­tors.

“In fact, we are pre­pared to mount a phys­i­cal cam­paign on the road against Stu­art Young and any­one who try to un­der­mine the Gov­ern­ment, as this Gov­ern­ment moves to en­sure progress and wealth for all of the peo­ple of T&T.”

Ad­dress­ing work­ers ear­li­er, Ro­get is­sued a warn­ing to de­trac­tors, par­tic­u­lar­ly Young, ac­cus­ing them of at­tempt­ing to un­der­mine the Gov­ern­ment.

He al­so sug­gest­ed they were pre­pared to launch a street cam­paign in re­sponse.

“Stand firm, stand strong. We are this close to achiev­ing the open­ing back of that re­fin­ery. And no Stu­art Young, no wan­na-be po­lit­i­cal leader of the PNM, none of them who cry croc­o­dile tears will stop us from the work­ers re­ceiv­ing the jus­tice that they de­serve be­cause when that hap­pen, it is not just for­mer Petrotrin work­ers will ben­e­fit, it is all of T&T that is go­ing to ben­e­fit.”

Ro­get stressed the need for strat­e­gy, not­ing that si­lence on cer­tain mat­ters did not mean the unions were not ac­tive­ly en­gaged be­hind the scenes.

Ro­get al­so as­sured that leg­is­la­tion is be­ing put in place to pro­tect work­ers’ rights and that all wage ne­go­ti­a­tions will be set­tled.

He said JTUM’s re­quest for a meet­ing with Min­is­ter of Labour Leroy Bap­tiste has been con­firmed for May 13, where they will present pro­pos­als aimed at en­sur­ing ne­go­ti­a­tions are con­clud­ed.

Among the unions ex­pect­ed to at­tend, he said, are T&TEC, Pow­er­gen, NP, UWI, UTT, NTA, YTEPP and Na­tion­al Quar­ry work­ers, who fall un­der the OW­TU.

He added that ne­go­ti­a­tions in­volv­ing postal work­ers, as well as the Trans­port and In­dus­tri­al Work­ers Union cov­er­ing PTSC and MTS, would al­so be ad­dressed.

“I can’t to­day give you a time­line, but I can as­sure you that every sin­gle out­stand­ing ne­go­ti­a­tion will be set­tled in the in­ter­est of jus­tice,” he said.