Jensen La Vende

Se­nior Re­porter

jensen.lavende@guardian.co.tt

For­mer fi­nance min­is­ter Colm Im­bert is promis­ing dis­missed work­ers of the Com­mu­ni­ty-Based En­vi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion and En­hance­ment Pro­gramme (CEPEP) that the Op­po­si­tion will fight for them.

He made the promise as he ad­dressed sup­port­ers at the Mal­abar Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre on Thurs­day night dur­ing a meet­ing en­ti­tled In De­fence of the Peo­ple.

Im­bert was at the time com­ment­ing on an af­fi­davit signed by CEPEP chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer Kei­th Ed­dy, in which Ed­dy claimed he had been pres­sured by for­mer lo­cal gov­ern­ment min­is­ter Faris Al-Rawi to ex­tend con­tracts in the lead-up to the April 28 Gen­er­al Elec­tion.

Im­bert ex­plained that the then Cab­i­net, as far back as 2015, gave the CEPEP board the au­thor­i­ty to award new con­tracts and that stip­u­la­tion was nev­er changed.

Last month, over 300 CEPEP con­trac­tors were ter­mi­nat­ed. Al­to­geth­er, the con­trac­tors hired more than 10,000 work­ers, who were al­so placed on the bread­line be­cause of the dis­missals.

The con­tracts were ter­mi­nat­ed pend­ing an au­dit, as the Gov­ern­ment found that many—due to end next year—had been ex­tend­ed to 2029. This is now the sub­ject of a court bat­tle, as both the Op­po­si­tion and Gov­ern­ment tus­sle over the le­gal­i­ty of the ter­mi­na­tion.

Im­bert said that pri­or to the ter­mi­na­tion, Par­lia­ment had ap­proved $60 mil­lion for CEPEP to pay con­trac­tors up to the end of the year. With the con­trac­tors ter­mi­nat­ed, he ques­tioned how the mon­ey would now be used.

“They came and asked for an ex­tra $60 mil­lion to pay for all those PNM con­tracts. That was in June. And when they fin­ish get the ap­proval, they ter­mi­nate all the con­tracts. And now say­ing the con­tracts had no ap­proval. Jok­ers! Let’s see where they’re go­ing with that. So that’s why I say we will fight them.”

He said in 2015, a note was tak­en to Cab­i­net by him which au­tho­rised CEPEP to award new con­tracts as re­quired.

He added, “That was nev­er re­scind­ed. That note was nev­er var­ied. Even the same UNC has not re­scind­ed that.”

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les con­firmed the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment will be de­fend­ing the dis­missed work­ers, as she ques­tioned what love the Gov­ern­ment had for the most vul­ner­a­ble in the coun­try.

She said there may be a link be­tween the can­cel­la­tion of CEPEP con­tracts and a sup­posed in­crease in dengue fever, as there was stag­nant wa­ter in pub­lic ar­eas and un­kempt pub­lic spaces.