Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath has threat­ened to sue Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Work­ers' Union (CWU) sec­re­tary gen­er­al Joanne Ogeer for defama­tion over re­cent com­ments she made in re­la­tion to mat­ters at ma­jor­i­ty state-owned com­pa­ny Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Ser­vices of Trinidad and To­ba­go (TSTT).

Padarath, through his lawyers led by Anand Ram­lo­gan, SC, of Free­dom Law Cham­bers, made the threat in a pre-ac­tion pro­to­col let­ter sent to Ogeer on Mon­day.

The let­ter came days af­ter TSTT chair­man Kern Dass and cor­po­rate sec­re­tary Vive­ka Par­gass threat­ened sim­i­lar le­gal ac­tion over al­le­ga­tions made by Ogeer while ad­dress­ing a press con­fer­ence last week.

In the cor­re­spon­dence, ob­tained by Guardian Me­dia, at­tor­ney Jared Ja­groo claimed that Ogeer made defam­a­to­ry state­ments about Padarath's al­leged con­nec­tion to Dass.

"The words com­plained of are not to be un­der­stood as iso­lat­ed ques­tions or neu­tral re­quests for in­for­ma­tion. They con­veyed fac­tu­al al­le­ga­tions and im­pu­ta­tions about our Client's con­duct, in­tegri­ty, and re­la­tion­ship with Mr Kern Dass," Ja­groo said.

"They im­put­ed dis­hon­esty, cor­rup­tion, abuse of pub­lic of­fice, im­prop­er fi­nan­cial in­flu­ence, se­ri­ous mis­con­duct in­com­pat­i­ble with the du­ties and re­spon­si­bil­i­ties of a Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment and Min­is­ter of Gov­ern­ment," he added.

Ja­groo not­ed that Ogeer did not pro­vide any ev­i­dence to but­tress her al­le­ga­tions.

"You knew, or were reck­less as to whether, the im­pu­ta­tions were true," Ja­groo said.

"Any rep­e­ti­tion of the al­le­ga­tions as ques­tions, al­le­ga­tions or mat­ters re­quir­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion does not pre­vent them from be­ing defam­a­to­ry, nor does it pro­vide a prop­er ba­sis for pub­li­ca­tion," he added.

He not­ed that the me­dia con­fer­ence was broad­cast live on so­cial me­dia and was cov­ered by the main­stream me­dia caus­ing se­ri­ous harm to Padarath's rep­u­ta­tion.

Ja­groo gave Ogeer 14 days in which to give a writ­ten apol­o­gy and pub­lish a full re­trac­tion.

He al­so re­quest­ed that the so­cial me­dia post be re­moved and that Ogeer pay com­pen­sa­tion for defama­tion and le­gal costs as well as give an un­der­tak­ing not to re­peat the al­le­ga­tions pub­licly.

Ja­groo stat­ed that if the de­mands are not met with­in two weeks, Padarath would ex­er­cise his right to pur­sue a law­suit over the is­sue.