KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

Postal work­ers are set to in­ten­si­fy protest ac­tion to­day as they con­tin­ue to press the Gov­ern­ment to de­liv­er on a salary in­crease promised over a decade ago af­ter a 2011 job eval­u­a­tion.

Yes­ter­day about two dozen peo­ple—in­clud­ing work­ers and mem­bers of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Postal Work­ers Union (TTP­WU) cen­tral ex­ec­u­tive—were joined by the Joint Trade Union Move­ment (JTUM) as they marched from the Trinidad and To­ba­go Postal Cor­po­ra­tion (TTPost) in Ari­ma to TTPost in Tu­na­puna.

TTP­WU Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary David Forbes said to­day’s march would be strength­ened in num­bers as TTPost re­tirees, JTUM and the Sea­men and Wa­ter­front Work­ers Trade Union (SWW­TU) had all ex­pressed their sup­port for postal work­ers.

Forbes said work­ers would be march­ing from the Aranguez Sa­van­nah to the Min­istry of Fi­nance in Port-of-Spain from 10 am to­day.

Protest ac­tion by the TTP­WU be­gan in Feb­ru­ary and in­clud­ed a march to the of­fice of Chief Per­son­nel Of­fi­cer Dr Daryl Din­di­al in Port-of-Spain.

JTUM al­so vowed to demon­strate greater sol­i­dar­i­ty with port work­ers who con­tin­ued to protest against low wages and un­safe work­ing con­di­tions at the ports in Port-of-Spain and Scar­bor­ough.

JTUM’s gen­er­al sec­re­tary, Ozzi War­wick, told Guardian Me­dia they were throw­ing sup­port be­hind the SWW­TU and stressed there was no bad blood be­tween the unions.

Speak­ing out­side the TTPost of­fice in Ari­ma, War­wick said, “JTUM stands with the port work­ers and the SWW­TU. We stand fer­vent­ly be­hind the port work­ers of Trinidad and To­ba­go ... The Joint Trade Union Move­ment stands solid­ly, solid­ly be­hind the Sea­men Wa­ter­front Trade Union and the port work­ers of Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

The move comes a day af­ter SWW­TU pres­i­dent gen­er­al Michael An­nisette called on all unions to help the work­ers in their fight.

How­ev­er, it is un­clear if port work­ers, who have been en­gaged in their own bat­tles for bet­ter wages, will phys­i­cal­ly join to­day’s march.

When Guardian Me­dia reached out to An­nisette for a re­sponse, he said he did not want to spec­u­late what work­ers would do to­day.

Port work­ers have been protest­ing since the start of Oc­to­ber, de­mand­ing a 12 per cent salary in­crease for the pe­ri­od 2014 to 2017.

On Oc­to­ber 3 and 4, port work­ers walked off the job, cit­ing con­cerns about health and safe­ty is­sues at the port.

On Wednes­day, An­nisette said port work­ers in To­ba­go would strike again if con­di­tions at that port re­main un­re­solved.

Yes­ter­day, op­er­a­tions con­tin­ued at TTPost’s Ari­ma, Tu­na­puna, and Port-of-Spain of­fices.

Guardian Me­dia reached out to TTPost man­age­ment for com­ment on the ef­fect of the protest ac­tion, but up to late yes­ter­day, there was no re­sponse.