Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal has been or­dered to pay over $500,000 in com­pen­sa­tion to Oil­field Work­ers’ Trade Union (OW­TU) pres­i­dent gen­er­al An­cel Ro­get for defama­tion.

Ac­cord­ing to a re­lease from the union is­sued yes­ter­day, on De­cem­ber 17, High Court Judge Na­dia Kan­ga­loo up­held Ro­get’s case and or­dered the com­pen­sa­tion.

Ro­get sued Mooni­lal af­ter he made pub­lic state­ments al­leg­ing that Ro­get had ac­cept­ed $15 mil­lion from the Gov­ern­ment to “re­main silent on labour is­sues.”

In the re­lease, the union sought to ex­plain how the al­le­ga­tion arose.

It stat­ed that dur­ing his 2016 na­tion­al bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion on Oc­to­ber 5, 2015, Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert an­nounced that $15 mil­lion had been al­lo­cat­ed to the trade union move­ment (the Joint Trade Union Move­ment (JTUM) and the Na­tion­al Trade Union Cen­tre (NATUC)).

It said that Ro­get im­me­di­ate­ly wrote to Im­bert in­form­ing him that JTUM, which he serves as pres­i­dent of, would not ac­cept the mon­ey.

“Com­rade Ro­get’s re­jec­tion of the Gov­ern­ment’s al­lo­ca­tion was im­me­di­ate­ly cir­cu­lat­ed wide­ly in both the elec­tron­ic me­dia and in the three dai­ly news­pa­pers,” it said.

“Fur­ther, his re­jec­tion of the Gov­ern­ment’s al­lo­cat­ed sum was re­port­ed to Par­lia­ment by the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance on Oc­to­ber 13, 2015, dur­ing the bud­get de­bate,” it added.

It said that the judg­ment was cru­cial in clear­ing Ro­get’s name.

“Com­rade Ro­get has al­ways stat­ed pub­licly that he nev­er ac­cept­ed or re­ceived any mon­ey, and cer­tain­ly not $15 mil­lion from the PNM gov­ern­ment,” it said.

The union not­ed that for­mer MP, au­thor, and ra­dio host Dr Mor­gan Job made sim­i­lar defam­a­to­ry state­ments in re­la­tion to Ro­get.

It said that while Job had al­so been served with a pre-ac­tion pro­to­col let­ter threat­en­ing a defama­tion law­suit, lit­i­ga­tion was not pur­sued af­ter Job passed away in May 2018.

The union al­so sought to warn cit­i­zens over re­peat­ing the false al­le­ga­tion and wrong­ly tar­nish­ing Ro­get’s rep­u­ta­tion.

“Com­rade Ro­get is pre­pared to take le­gal ac­tion against any­one who, pub­licly, in­clud­ing on so­cial me­dia, per­pet­u­ates that defam­a­to­ry state­ment about the $15 mil­lion or any oth­er defam­a­to­ry, mis­lead­ing, and un­true state­ments,” it said.

Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, Mooni­lal said that his lawyers are await­ing the writ­ten judg­ment in or­der to file an ap­peal.

“I can say that we have de­cid­ed to ap­peal ... This mat­ter will be ap­pealed since we be­lieve the judge erred in both law and fact,” Mooni­lal said.

“It ap­pears that I can on­ly get jus­tice in the Court of Ap­peal or Lon­don,” he added.

He point­ed out that in 2020 he won sim­i­lar com­pen­sa­tion in a defama­tion law­suit against po­lit­i­cal ac­tivist and news­pa­per colum­nist Juli­et Davy but did not col­lect it.

“Since it’s the same amount, I am think­ing of get­ting Ms Davy to pay Mr Ro­get di­rect­ly,” he said.

Last month, the OW­TU was among five trade unions and three small­er po­lit­i­cal par­ties that en­tered in­to an al­liance with the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) for the up­com­ing gen­er­al elec­tion.

Ro­get was rep­re­sent­ed by Dou­glas Mendes, SC, An­tho­ny Bul­lock, and Leah Ab­du­lah of Chancery Cham­bers.

Mooni­lal was rep­re­sent­ed by Lar­ry Lal­la, SC.