PNM BRUTAL TO WORKERS

Larry Achong who resigned as Labour Minister on Friday last, joined striking Atlantic LNG workers in Point Fortin yesterday morning and described the PNM Government as brutal. After seeing the turnout of armed policemen and soldiers surrounding the workers, Achong who is the Point Fortin MP said that he was reviewing his future with the ruling party. “I now publicly declare, that I will have to review my relationship with a Government and a party that had intended to brutalise the people of Point Fortin, if you all had resisted here today,” Achong said, amidst loud cheers from the protesting workers. “That was the intention of the Government, to brutalise the people if you had misbehaved or if you had prevented people (workers) from going in (into Atlantic). There is no other reason why you have five hundred people from outside in Point Fortin today,” Achong continued.

Addressing hundreds of contract workers at their strike camp opposite the Atlantic LNG’s Train IV project yesterday morning, Achong who faced scores of police officers and Defence Force personnel, waded into his own government, accusing his leader, Prime Minister Patrick Manning, of employing strong-arm tactics against the “peaceful workers of Point Fortin.” Achong, who two days ago told Newsday he was committed to the PNM, also called on the workers to continue their struggle in a peaceful manner, for better wages and working conditions. “I am telling you all, keep up the struggle...what you are asking for is not unreasonable. Say your prayers that soon this thing will be over. This impasse ought to have been ended weeks ago,” Achong was applauded throughout his speech. Achong spent most of the day holding meetings and discussions with several people.
However, despite reports from the protesting workers that hundreds of armed police and army officials were being deployed to the Atlantic site, only around 75 officers arrived in three police buses, to keep watch on the proceedings.

One bus contained officers from the Crime Suppression Unit (CSU), another contained officers from South-Western Police Division and the last 25-seater police bus contained members of the Defence Force. Achong tendered his resignation as Labour Minister, to Prime Minister Manning during the sitting of Parliament last Friday. On the weekend, he told Newsday he had resigned because of  Cabinet’s failure to approve the Sectoral Minimum Wage Bill for the heavy construction industry. Coming out in support of Achong yesterday, was Public Services Association (PSA) president Jennifer Baptiste-Primus, who questioned Government’s intentions over the deployment of the Defence Force and Police to keep watch over the protesting workers at the LNG site. “What in God’s name is happening in this country when the Government has to send in all these soldiers and police officers at a camp site where workers are exercising their democratic rights to peaceful protest,” Baptiste-Primus told Newsday.

“Is the Prime Minister aware of what he is doing? It is inconceivable that a prime minister would act so recklessly,” Baptiste-Primus continued. Leader of the striking ALNG contract workers, Ernest Thompson, praised workers on their massive turnout saying, “a powerful message” had been sent to both Bechtel International, and the Trinidad and Tobago government. “This morning we saw an attempt by Bechtel to see the eighty percent that they thought were willing to come to work,” he said, alluding to a statement by a senior Bechtel official that the vast majority of contract workers were willing to return to work but were being prevented by a “small, vocal minority.” “The majority of the 2,700 workers came to the site without bags and without helmets and came to see what Bechtel was really doing, and they were ashamed at Bechtel paying all the police and the army to come into Point Fortin. Not one single worker had returned to work. I call on the project’s main contractor to begin direct negotiations with the workers,” Thompson added.