Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

The Caribbean must re­main a zone of peace - but it must nev­er be­come a zone for gangs, car­tels and or­gan­ised crime.

This is the po­si­tion of Oil­field Work­ers' Trade Union pres­i­dent gen­er­al An­cel Ro­get on the re­cent Unit­ed States mil­i­tary de­ploy­ment in the re­gion and its strike which de­stroyed a boat which the US claims was com­man­deered by 11 Tren de Aragua mem­bers who were trans­port­ing a drug ship­ment out of Venezuela. Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has strong­ly sup­port­ed the US ef­fort.

Asked his view on the US mil­i­tary pres­ence and re­lat­ed is­sues, Ro­get said, "The OW­TU main­tains its strong and long­stand­ing po­si­tion on the Caribbean re­main­ing a zone of peace. We be­lieve that the Caribbean must be free from mil­i­tary con­flict. How­ev­er, we in­sist that it must al­so be free from the war­ring con­se­quences of the un­lim­it­ed flow of drugs, arms and am­mu­ni­tion.

"This has been a di­rect threat to our cit­i­zens liv­ing with a sense of safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty. The Caribbean must nev­er be­come a zone for gangs, car­tels, or­gan­ised crime and the free move­ment of so­phis­ti­cat­ed arms and am­mu­ni­tions, which has re­sult­ed in thou­sands of mur­ders in our coun­try."

The OW­TU has sup­port­ed the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress in a coali­tion arrange­ment since last year.

Since the UNC took Gov­ern­ment in April, three OW­TU mem­bers have so far been ap­point­ed to state board po­si­tions.

Pointe-a-Pierre branch pres­i­dent Christo­pher Black­man was ap­point­ed in Ju­ly to the board of Paria Fu­el Trad­ing Com­pa­ny Lim­it­ed. Gen­er­al sec­re­tary Richard Lee and branch pres­i­dent Theophilus Hen­ry were ap­point­ed last week to the board of the Na­tion­al Train­ing Agency. Black­man is al­so on the Cab­i­net-ap­point­ed 12-mem­ber com­mit­tee man­dat­ed to de­ter­mine the fea­si­bil­i­ty of re­open­ing the for­mer Petrotrin re­fin­ery in Pointe-a-Pierre.