Oilfield Workers’ Trade Union president general Ancel Roget is again is alleging that buyers have already been found for “different parts of Petrotrin, including the refinery.” He is also taking the Government and Petrotrin board to task for the inconsistency in the number of workers to be sent home.
Responding to a news conference called by Petrotrin chairman Wilfred Espinet yesterday, Roget accused the board of continuously “putting out misinformation” in the public domain.
He said a case in point was the constant changing in the numbers of employees going home.
“They are not open and honest with the country, while they are peddling their misinformation people are starved for the facts, for the correct information.”
Roget said the union had been consistent in saying that it is not only 1,700 workers that are being sent home.
“He is not telling the country is all the workers - 3,500 permanent workers, 2,000 casual and 3,500 service provider workers contractor employees - all of whom are attached to Petrotrin. It is 9,000, we have been consistent.”
Roget said it was hard to “trust them with the correct information with regard to the workers, so then how can we trust these people with the shutting down of the country’s only refinery, with the country’s asset, how can we trust them? They are not honest.”
Roget said the union has information that “they already have buyers to buy different parts of Petrotrin, including the refinery. That is most dishonest. How could they be allowed to get away with that?”
He said there is the need for “an open, free, frank and open discussion, a national consultation because the Government cannot take a decision to close down the country’s only refinery and sell it to somebody, chop up the Exploration and Production and sell it to other people.”
Roget said this runs contrary to a Memorandum of Understanding signed in April this year for continued dialogue.