Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior Re­porter

jesse.ramdeo@cnc3.co.tt

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath says the board of the Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Ser­vices of Trinidad and To­ba­go (TSTT) has or­dered an im­me­di­ate re­view of a man­age­ment de­ci­sion af­fect­ing about 150 call cen­tre work­ers con­tract­ed through Am­plia.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia, Padarath con­firmed he met with TSTT yes­ter­day, a day af­ter con­cerns emerged that the State-owned telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions com­pa­ny was con­sid­er­ing end­ing its arrange­ment with Am­plia and trans­fer­ring the call cen­tre work to an­oth­er con­trac­tor – Hum­ming­bird Hold­ings.

The work­ers have re­port­ed­ly been told their con­tracts will not be re­newed be­yond Sep­tem­ber 30, giv­ing them about 30 days’ no­tice.

Con­cerns have al­so been raised that some work­ers, who may be ab­sorbed by the new con­trac­tor, could face sig­nif­i­cant­ly low­er salaries.

But Padarath says the de­ci­sion to change the man­age­ment of the call cen­tres was not tak­en by the TSTT board.

He said the board ad­vised him that the mat­ter had not been brought be­fore it as a pol­i­cy de­ci­sion.

“I’ve been ad­vised by the board of TSTT that this pol­i­cy de­ci­sion, as it re­lates to the call cen­tres, was not brought to the at­ten­tion of the board, and there­fore the board has asked for an im­me­di­ate re­view of this pol­i­cy de­ci­sion.”

Padarath said the board has in­struct­ed man­age­ment to ex­plain how the de­ci­sion was made and where the pol­i­cy guide­line for chang­ing the call cen­tre con­trac­tor orig­i­nat­ed.

“At this point in time, the board has tak­en the po­si­tion that they will call in man­age­ment to re­view and find out where that pol­i­cy guide­line came from in terms of a change of the man­age­ment of the call cen­tres from Am­plia to this oth­er con­trac­tor, and that en­tire process will now be re­viewed.”

He said the is­sue goes be­yond an op­er­a­tional mat­ter be­cause it in­volves a change in pol­i­cy, which falls with­in the board’s re­mit.

Padarath al­so clar­i­fied that the com­pa­ny re­port­ed­ly be­ing con­sid­ered for the call cen­tre work, Hum­ming­bird Hold­ings, is not the same en­ti­ty linked to the pro­posed con­struc­tion of AI da­ta cen­tres, Hum­ming­bird AI Hold­ings LLC.

The min­is­ter said this dis­tinc­tion is sig­nif­i­cant and that he is await­ing fur­ther in­for­ma­tion from the TSTT board be­fore mak­ing ad­di­tion­al dis­clo­sures.

A se­nior of­fi­cial from Hum­ming­bird AI Hold­ings LLC al­so told Guardian Me­dia that the com­pa­ny is not con­nect­ed to Am­plia and has no in­volve­ment in call cen­tres.

“The on­ly thing I can of­fer is that we are not con­nect­ed with Am­plia in any way, and have no in­volve­ment in call cen­tres.”

The clar­i­fi­ca­tion is sig­nif­i­cant giv­en the re­cent at­ten­tion sur­round­ing Hum­ming­bird AI Hold­ings LLC and its pro­posed in­vest­ment in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Last month, Hum­ming­bird AI moved to counter grow­ing pub­lic scep­ti­cism sur­round­ing its pro­posed mul­ti-bil­lion-dol­lar ar­ti­fi­cial in­tel­li­gence in­fra­struc­ture project, re­leas­ing de­tails about its lead­er­ship, in­ter­na­tion­al part­ners and long-term vi­sion af­ter crit­i­cism over the com­pa­ny’s lim­it­ed pub­lic pro­file.

Hum­ming­bird AI is one of the com­pa­nies that signed a mem­o­ran­dum of un­der­stand­ing (MoU) with the Gov­ern­ment for pre­lim­i­nary co­op­er­a­tion, due dili­gence and co­or­di­na­tion on a pro­posed 150-megawatt ar­ti­fi­cial in­tel­li­gence in­fra­struc­ture and da­ta-cen­tre fa­cil­i­ty.

The project could even­tu­al­ly ex­pand to as much as 500 megawatts, with ini­tial com­mer­cial op­er­a­tions tar­get­ed for the first quar­ter of 2028, sub­ject to due dili­gence and the par­ties ad­vanc­ing the project.

How­ev­er, the Hum­ming­bird AI of­fi­cial has now made clear that the com­pa­ny has no in­volve­ment in call cen­tre op­er­a­tions and is not con­nect­ed to Am­plia.

Padarath said he will pro­vide fur­ther in­for­ma­tion once he re­ceives an up­dat­ed re­port from the TSTT board fol­low­ing its re­view.