Leader of the Op­po­si­tion Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has told the Oil­field Work­ers Trade Union, its pres­i­dent gen­er­al An­cel Ro­get and David Ab­du­lah to take their ul­ti­ma­tums else­where and said she and her par­ty will not be black­mailed to re­main silent on is­sues of na­tion­al im­por­tance.

Yes­ter­day Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­spond­ed to a 48-hour ul­ti­ma­tum by the union for the op­po­si­tion to state its po­si­tion on the Pa­tri­ot­ic En­er­gies and Tech­nol­o­gy Com­pa­ny win­ning the bid to ac­quire the re­fin­ery or face the force of the union.

She said, “The UNC did not close down Petrotrin! Ten thou­sand per­ma­nent, tem­po­rary and con­tract­ed Petrotrin work­ers lost their jobs due to the fail­ures of Kei­th Row­ley on one side and the An­cel Ro­get, David Ab­du­lah tan­dem on the oth­er side. These men need to ac­knowl­edge that they presided over this mess, take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and cease look­ing for a scape­goat to save face.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said any trans­ac­tion in­volv­ing pub­lic prop­er­ty to pri­vate sec­tor en­ti­ties must be done with full trans­paren­cy and she called on Ro­get, Ab­du­lah and the OW­TU to un­der­stand that they are now pri­vate busi­ness­men.

“Had this trans­ac­tion been be­tween an en­ti­ty as­so­ci­at­ed with the UNC and the gov­ern­ment or an en­ti­ty deemed owned by the so called 1% and the gov­ern­ment, both men, as well as the OW­TU, would be protest­ing for trans­paren­cy and ac­count­abil­i­ty. Every­one must be held to the same stan­dard!”

Per­sad-Biss­esar said, “Hid­ing be­hind threats and al­le­ga­tions against the UNC may seem from their per­spec­tive, to be an ef­fec­tive way of de­flect­ing at­ten­tion from the ques­tions their own union mem­bers have con­cern­ing their loss of jobs. They have nev­er ex­plained their fail­ure to pro­tect the Petrotrin work­ers, some of whom com­mit­ted sui­cide, lost their homes and their fam­i­lies.”

How­ev­er, the Op­po­si­tion warned against any threats to her and her par­ty.

“Don’t be mis­tak­en, the UNC and I will not be black­mailed by any­one to re­main silent on is­sues of pub­lic in­ter­est in or­der to gain sup­port for any elec­tion. We are about plans and poli­cies to get our coun­try work­ing again.”