Rad­hi­ca Sookraj

De­spite threats of dis­missal, work­ers en­gaged in the con­struc­tion of the $7.2 bil­lion high­way ex­ten­sion to Point Fortin stayed off the job for a sixth day yes­ter­day await­ing a meet­ing with of­fi­cials of OAS Con­struc­to­ra Ltd.

Dressed for work in cov­er­alls, boots and hel­mets, the work­ers said they stood ready to work but would do so on­ly if they are as­sured prop­er wages would be paid and safe­ty con­di­tions. OAS, the main con­trac­tor of the project, has re­fused to meet with the Oil­fields Work­ers' Trade Union (OW­TU) as it does not hold recog­nised ma­jor­i­ty sta­tus. But this has not de­terred the OW­TU from giv­ing the work­ers ad­vice.

Work­er rep­re­sen­ta­tive Bish­nu Ramd­han said even though the work­ers were giv­en "threat­en­ing let­ters" on Fri­day, they were unit­ed in their stance to lob­by for bet­ter con­di­tions of work."We are not go­ing to be in­tim­i­dat­ed. We are wait­ing for them to call us. They are try­ing to put fear in­to us by say­ing we will face dis­missal, but if this has to go to the In­dus­tri­al Court and the Min­istry of Labour, it will," Ramd­han said.

He added that on Sat­ur­day, OAS re­moved three tents from the Gol­con­da work site to de­ter work­ers from en­gag­ing in work stop­pages. How­ev­er, Ramd­han said the work­ers put up a tar­pau­lin to pro­tect them­selves from the el­e­ments."They took away the wa­ter cool­ers. Now we have to buy our own wa­ter," Ramd­han said. Labour re­la­tions of­fi­cer of the OW­TU Aaron Moyne ac­cused OAS of tak­ing wa­ter from drains and sew­er lines to wet the roads. He said poor light­ing con­tin­ues to be a cause for con­cern. He al­so al­leged that trucks were be­ing op­er­at­ed with­out in­sur­ance.

Moyne said when he con­tact­ed OAS of­fi­cials on Sat­ur­day, he was told the com­pa­ny had shut down all ne­go­ti­a­tions.

He said when both par­ties met with Labour Min­is­ter Er­rol Mc Leod last week, they were ad­vised to set up com­mit­tees for ne­go­ti­a­tions and the work­ers had com­plied and gave a re­vised pro­pos­al to OAS. How­ev­er, they nev­er got a re­sponse.By an in­ter­nal memo sent last week, work­ers were told that "the il­le­gal stop­page of work and mass gath­er­ing of work­force at the OAS camp­sites dur­ing work­ing hours is strict­ly pro­hib­it­ed and must stop im­me­di­ate­ly."

The memo read, "In cas­es of griev­ances the com­pa­ny has a griev­ance pro­ce­dure out­lined on the com­pa­ny's pol­i­cy hand­book, page six. This is a warn­ing to all work­ers and if this con­duct per­sists or con­tin­ues, man­age­ment will have no al­ter­na­tive but to take fur­ther and dis­ci­pli­nary ac­tions, in­clu­sive of dis­missal."Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Works and In­fra­struc­ture Sta­cy Roop­nar­ine said OAS and the work­ers must set­tle their is­sues bi­lat­er­al­ly. She said both par­ties were ad­vised to set up a ne­go­ti­at­ing com­mit­tee and dis­cuss the is­sues.