 No Surrender to Powerlessness
Last Thursday, in an exchange of gunfire between officers who were on an exercise and gunmen in Trou Macaque Laventille, police killed 5 young men. That’s how the official story went. In a 3:35 a.m. statement (reminiscent of President Trump) the Prime Minister declared: “There is no good end to bad deeds, bad company and a life of crime.”. The Police Commissioner announced: "If it is a war they want, it is war they will get. One of my officers was actually hit by a bullet and saved by a bulletproof vest. That is justification for us to fire and …. It is one shot, one kill.” The National Security Minister called on citizens to “stand with law enforcement officers”. After all these statements presenting a particular narrative, both the Commissioner and the PCA Head announced that simultaneous investigations were launched, the internal police investigation being conducted by the ACP (Homicide). So, after the implicit declarations of justifiable killing by the police, investigations are now proceeding and today the Commissioner yesterday said he couldn’t say if the officers were wearing body cameras “because the investigation was ongoing”. Many in a society battered by years of runaway murderous violence unleashed on citizens, responded to the Trou Macaque killings and the CoP’s gun talk by literally saying – Yes, kill them all. In the absence of a completed investigation, the police killings were welcomed because ‘they deserved it’ because “these 5 ' young men' who kiss guns and challenge authority”, one of them seen on social media with illegal guns in the past. We Need The Facts Before we rush to conclusion, we need the facts of what happened last Thursday. There are some inconsistencies in the narrative. What was the exercise the police were on? The police have told us, they were:
The shot men were removed from the crime scene and relatives and neighbours claim they ‘washed down’ crime scene. They also claim that the bodies were being washed when they got to the hospital. So, what really happened? We all need to know the facts, so we can draw warranted conclusions. We All Want Safety and Security Every citizen of TT wants a safe society to live in. Everyone wants to feel safe at home, on the streets, to be able to go out and enjoy the natural beauty of the country, to enjoy social events with family and friends. But, with 6,972 murders in our population of 1.3 million in the last 18 years (435 to October 31 this year); with record annual tolls of 494 or more in 4 of these 18 year; with home invasions, multiple killings in recreational areas; with death increasingly the outcome of a robbery at any time of day or night, citizens feel that nowhere or no time is safe. A sense of unease and powerlessness has showed out lives and there seems to be no letting up. We have wanted safety and security and a return to our free movement without fear all along. However, to recover our Right to Safety and Security it cannot be by any means whatsoever. A few months ago, we were assured that the names, addresses and phone numbers of all the gang members were known to the state and what was needed by the police was the passage of the Anti-gang legislation. It was assented to on May 15 and we were expectant. A substantive Police Commissioner was appointed on August 5 and our hopes for a respite rose again. And, this killing last Thursday evoked a sense that “Police officers have been given a dose of courage and motivation to go after criminals….” As the Police Association President put it. As battered and cowed as we may feel, as much as we want action, we must be careful not to descend into savage mentality of those who have inflicted brutality on us. We accept the right of police officers to defend themselves against violent attack, a right which we, as citizens, also cherish. We must also be careful that we do not now give the police a license to kill with impunity, as those who have terrorized us for all this time have claimed for themselves. We jealously guard our governance founded on law and order and due process. We must be careful that we are not driven by our sense of powerlessness to support the development of a state of police powers instead of a state of law and order. Clyde Weatherhead A Citizen Fighting for Our Right to Safety and Security 31 October 2018 Government Never Intended to Consider Any Other Outcome for Petrotrin
I still read some voices speaking romantically about ‘alternatives’ to Government’s plan for Petrotrin. I also hear a lot of voices speaking in blissful ignorance even today about only refinery workers losing their jobs and Government should negotiate packages including land and houses, etc. Both sets of voices have completely misunderstood the PNM’s ‘seamless transition’ strategy for Petrotrin, or shall I now say Heritage and Paria Cos, which is the strategy tried and tested in the saga of BWIA-CAL over the 2006-7 New Year period. Fortunately, or otherwise, having grown up in a house headed by a man who spent his entire working life at BWIA, I was also involved in the PNM’s ‘seamless transition’ of the airline, having been asked to assist CATTU in the negotiations for its Collective Agreement in 2006, Perhaps if the trade union movement and others had studied that experience a bit more closely, they would have understood what the PNM was about with Petrotrin. When the intention to close the refinery was finally announced on August 28, I posed the question on Facebook – Is this Government’s Opening Gambit or Final Position? The answers I got told me that those responding clearly did not have that feeling of déjà vu that I did having lived the BWIA-CAL experience. Petrotrin has been an almost carbon-copy edition of BWIA-CAL. From the lack of real information, to the ritual dance of ‘negotiations’ in bad faith, including signing of MOA’s with no intention to honour, to big announcement, to the bullish drive to action the transition plan, firing all the workers, registering company names while pretending to be discussing, to the injunctions and Appeal Court proceedings – All of this scripted, even with some of the same authors, as in 2006-7., The outcome – CAL replaced BWIA, with an aircraft mystically flying off to London as a BWIA plane with a BWIA crew on December 31 and the return flight with the exact same aircraft and exact same crew, but now CAL and not BWIA. The unions gone, the Collective Agreements gone, and a few workers ‘re-employed’ to do the same jobs in a company doing essentially the same thing but on individual contract, rather than negotiated agreements. Canada’s Bombardier enjoyed lucrative contracts to supply turbo-prop airplanes that Bombardier managers at CAL convinced Government to buy. Now, here we are. All Petrotrin workers being dismissed. Heritage and Paria (and perhaps the other 2 companies the Energy and Finance Ministers spoke of) will hire some back without the 2 unions and with NO Collective Agreements. Even some of the consultants directing from the shadows are the same. What is happening now, is exactly what the PNM intended all along. But, they pretended to be unsure, to be doing in-depth studies and making decisive moves to address issues which were illusions to disguise the real intent. The union, forgetful of the BWIA-CAL ‘seamless transition’ harboured illusions that the company and Government were ‘listening to them’ with the establishment of the Lashley Committee and the signing of the April MOA. The Government was very sure of its objectives and executed its plan without wavering. Where is the debt - $185M US and $175M US – that were supposed to be the ‘real’ problems, the straws that ‘broke the Petrotrin bank’? Where is the money ‘in these hard times’ S1B, then $2B to pay off the dismissed workers coming from? All but disappeared. They were never the real issues in the first place. They were part of the ‘air war’ to keep attention focused away from the ‘ground war’ itself. The severance packages didn’t even have to be negotiated. They were already part of the Collective Agreements and the cost of dismissing all 5,000 or so workers could easily have been calculated. The Executive Board and Management morphed ‘seamlessly’ almost unnoticed into what is now calling itself the Transition Team. No, a Rose by any other Name is not as sweet. Everything from these seemingly innocuous name changes were part of the deadly ‘seamless transition’ reenacted at Petrotrin-Heritage/Paria et al. Hopefully, the industrial relations experts and historians will pay more attention to analysing and recording the lessons of this episode than was done with BWIA-CAL. There will surely more déjà vu to come as long as the architects of this Modus Operandi occupy the seat of power. Approaching such situations with romanticism, delusion and faith in the word of those whose deed does not match their word will yield no different outcome in the future unfortunately. Clyde A Weatherhead A Citizen Fighting still for the Nation-building Project 15 October 2018  2019 Budget, Petrotrin and the Ghost of BWIA
In the leadup to the 2019 Budget presentation great anticipation was generated about the Finance Minister providing answers on the Petrotrin closure issue. The Budget speech and pronouncements by the Energy and Finance Ministers since have answered several questions. A Q&A on Petrotrin Q – Is the plan is to privatise the refinery? A - Madam Speaker, the refining assets will now be put in a separate company and we would entertain any viable offer from any investor who might wish to utilize the assets. P.26 Budget Speech. Q – Is Petrotrin going to be completely closed? A - The terminated permanent, temporary and casual employees of PETROTRIN will be provided with attractive termination packages. Early estimates put this termination payment at approximately $2.6 billion, consisting of $1.8 billion for all employees under the separation packages in nine (9) collective agreements….. P 28 ibid. In several post-Budget fora the Energy Minister made it clear. A new company will be created with 3 subsidiaries – one in E&P, one in Terminaling and one in which the assets of the Refinery will be placed for private bid. Previously, Chairman Espinet emphasised “all, all, all” the workers will be terminated. He also let the cat out of the bag when he told an AmCham forum that they want the union collective agreements out of the way. The Real Picture So, here is the nana (the meat) of the matter:
This is exactly the same outcome as the BWIA-CAL ‘seamless’ transition of December 31 2006 – January 1 2007. The PNM is pursuing its Modus Operandi (its preferred strategy) for the so-called transformation of state enterprises. This is an MO, developed and perfected in the TDA-IDC > TIDCO, CARONI > Nothing, BWIA > CAL episodes. This “seamless transition” strategy including the removal of sections of the Civil Service to ‘enterprise’ status -PUC>RIC, Health Service > RHAs, Post Office > TT Post, Air Traffic Control > TTCAA is fully ingrained in the PNM’s DNA. A part of this MO is the elimination of Unions and Collective Agreements with the objective of limiting wages, salaries and employment benefits to degrade labour costs. The Ghost of BWIA The ghost of BWIA-CAL is stalking the corridors of Petrotrin. This ‘seamless transformation’ is almost a carbon copy. Even the Consultant/Architect of the ‘seamless transition’ is the same person from BWIA-CAL. The outcome of the of that “seamless transition”:
So, it is no mystery that the complete closure of Petrotrin, mothballing and privatisation of the refinery was nowhere in the documentation before August 28. The company and subsidiaries are probably already registered but not disclosed. The Budget Speech, while confirming the complete closure-seamless transition strategy, continued to conceal from public information the transfer of company debt to state debt and the consequences of importation of fuel importation on the pockets of the citizens. The citizens, as the ultimate owners of the State-Owned Enterprises, must deeply analyse and learn from the MO of the PNM and these ‘seamless transformations’ which further burden them with the costs while private interests reap the benefits. In these episodes, the citizens have absolutely NO say. This is an issue of Public Right vs Private Right. Clyde Weatherhead A Citizen Fighting for Democratic Renewal of Our Society 3 October 2018 |
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