Ke­jan Haynes

Lead Ed­i­tor - News­gath­er­ing

ke­jan.haynes@guardian.co.tt

Port Au­thor­i­ty work­ers went back to work yes­ter­day,  al­beit “dis­cour­aged and de­mo­ti­vat­ed,” one work­er de­scribed it, as they com­plied with an In­dus­tri­al Court or­der, pre­vent­ing them from tak­ing any fur­ther in­dus­tri­al ac­tion. 

Port work­ers have been play­ing a cycli­cal cat-and-mouse game with the au­thor­i­ty, go­ing to work, clear­ing the back­log cre­at­ed by their pre­vi­ous ac­tions, but then tak­ing in­dus­tri­al ac­tion al­most im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter, cre­at­ing a new back­log. But with a court or­der loom­ing over their heads, Port Au­thor­i­ty of­fi­cials hope for nor­mal­cy in the fore­see­able fu­ture.

“We need to re­main op­ti­mistic,” said Port Au­thor­i­ty Chair­man Lyle Alexan­der in an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day.  “The court has said what it has said. The work­ers now have to work. So let’s just see how it turns out.”

Alexan­der con­firmed nor­mal op­er­a­tions yes­ter­day in all ar­eas. He said ves­sels were be­ing ser­viced, and there were de­liv­er­ies of con­tain­ers, ex­ports, and im­ports. The sheds were open as well. 

SWW­TU Pres­i­dent Gen­er­al Michael An­nisette de­clined calls from Guardian Me­dia and didn’t re­spond to What­sApp mes­sages.

The port re­turn­ing to nor­mal op­er­a­tions was wel­comed by the Ch­agua­nas Cham­ber of Com­merce and the Cou­va/Point Lisas Cham­ber of Com­merce who said the re­cent im­passe caused wide­spread dis­rup­tions and fi­nan­cial strain on its mem­bers, stake­hold­ers, and the broad­er busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty.

The cham­bers called on the Port of Port-of-Spain to pro­vide rent waivers for con­tain­ers and car­go that re­mained un­processed dur­ing the pe­ri­od of non-op­er­a­tion. 

They said this time of the year is par­tic­u­lar­ly crit­i­cal for small and medi­um-sized en­ter­pris­es (SMEs) which re­ly on the height­ened busi­ness ac­tiv­i­ty dur­ing the hol­i­day sea­son to re­coup loss­es sus­tained dur­ing slow­er pe­ri­ods. 

“While we ac­knowl­edge the ef­forts of the rel­e­vant au­thor­i­ties to ad­dress the con­cerns of work­ers and re­store nor­mal op­er­a­tions, the im­pact of the shut­down has been over­whelm­ing, high­light­ing the ur­gent need for a long-term so­lu­tion to pre­vent such oc­cur­rences in the fu­ture,”  the re­lease read.

UNC MPs di­vid­ed on In­dus­tri­al Court rul­ing

Mean­while, MP for Ch­agua­nas West Di­nesh Ram­bal­ly, who is al­so a for­mer in­dus­tri­al court judge, urged both PATT and SWW­TU to joint­ly re­quest court-me­di­at­ed dis­cus­sions.

He de­scribed the In­dus­tri­al Court as be­ing “fierce­ly in­de­pen­dent” with “ex­pert judges” who can me­di­ate.

“Di­a­logue is al­ways prefer­able to pro­tract­ed con­flict, es­pe­cial­ly when the stakes are so high for busi­ness­es, work­ers, and cit­i­zens alike,” Ram­bal­ly said.  “The dis­rup­tions at the port are not just a labour is­sue—they are a na­tion­al is­sue. Thou­sands of small busi­ness­es and liveli­hoods across the coun­try de­pend on smooth op­er­a­tions at the port, es­pe­cial­ly dur­ing this crit­i­cal hol­i­day sea­son. Pro­longed in­sta­bil­i­ty will have rip­ple ef­fects, threat­en­ing sup­ply chains and eco­nom­ic re­cov­ery.”

How­ev­er, his UNC col­league, Cou­va South MP Rudranath In­dars­ingh, called the rul­ing “high-hand­ed”, “un­de­mo­c­ra­t­ic”, and “an at­tempt to de­flect from the re­al source of fail­ure.”

“Gov­ern­ment’s de­ci­sion to file an in­junc­tion against the protest­ing work­ers–rather than ho­n­our the com­mit­ment of a 12 per cent in­crease–is more than a slap in the face of work­ers; it is an as­sault on the labour move­ment across the coun­try. It is al­so an at­tempt to weaponise the In­dus­tri­al Court,” In­dars­ingh claimed.

The In­dus­tri­al Court will hear the case again on De­cem­ber 6. ­—With re­port­ing by Shas­tri Boodan