Unions call on PM to intervene in Arcelor Mittal matter

JTUM and the Steel Workers Union of Trinidad and Tobago (SWUTT) yesterday delivered a letter to the PM at his office in St Clair, calling on him to make an urgent intervention.

Speaking with reporters yesterday, Ancel Roget, President of JTUM said, “We call on the Prime Minister, through written correspondence, to communicate, to instruct, to direct, to convince his ministers that they ought to meet very quickly so we can have this plant restarted and the workers and the country can benefit.” He said their mission was not for money but to get the relevant government ministers to meet with the investors.

“The SWUTT would have done their work and secured investors.

All we are asking for is for the relevant government ministers to meet with those investors and to do due diligence as a government and to set the framework for the type of discussions that would have allowed for the investor to go forward and purchase the plant which would benefit Trinidad and Tobago,” he said.

In the letter, JTUM indicated that SWUTT on January 24 wrote to the Minister of Public Utilities Fitzgerald Hinds, Finance Minister Colm Imbert, Minister of Trade and Industry Paula Gopee-Scoon and Labour Minister Jennifer Baptiste- Primus.

“The responses to the requests were simply that the Minister of Labour acknowledged receipt and the Minister of Trade and industry indicated her unavailability to meet with the representatives. Subsequent to this, the Minister of Trade and Industry, Paula Gopee-Scoon set February 15, as a date to meet with the union and then cancelled the said meeting. Regrettably, the SWUTT, was not even offered a response from the other Ministers,” the letter stated. Roget expressed hope that the PM acts immediately.

“All we are calling for is for the relevant ministers to come together to meet with a joint meeting where the investors will be present,” he said.

He warned that they were preparing, “not too long from now” to put “tens of thousands” of workers on the streets.

“Nobody understands until you protest, like you have to protest everything to get some kind response in this country,” he said.