For­mer Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion (PSA) pres­i­dent Clyde Weath­er­head be­lieves that PSA pres­i­dent and deputy To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) Chief Sec­re­tary Wat­son Duke can sit in the two full-time po­si­tions.

Weath­er­head said there isn’t any­thing that de­bars a trade union­ist or leader from be­ing in­volved in po­lit­i­cal ac­tiv­i­ty, elec­toral or oth­er­wise.

“That is his con­sti­tu­tion­al and hu­man right and civic re­spon­si­bil­i­ty. Be­ing in the THA Ex­ec­u­tive Coun­cil and the PSA ex­ec­u­tive is a sit­u­a­tion of con­flict of in­ter­est and there are ways to deal with that,” Weath­er­head said.

He added, “For the law to im­pose a choice in such sit­u­a­tions re­in­forces the no­tion that trade union­ists should not, con­trary to the con­sti­tu­tion­al right to par­tic­i­pate in the po­lit­i­cal af­fairs of the so­ci­ety and flies against the his­tor­i­cal ex­pe­ri­ence of this coun­try from Cipri­ani to now.”

He point­ed to peo­ple like Arthur Cipri­ani, Tubal Uri­ah ‘Buzz’ But­ler, Adri­an Co­la Rien­zi, Alphon­so Philbert, Theophilus ‘Far­go’ James and oth­ers, who he not­ed were all trade union lead­ers and politi­cians at the same time. “Weren’t they at dif­fer­ent points both trade union­ists and mem­bers of the Leg­isla­tive Coun­cil? Wasn’t Bhadase Sagan Ma­haraj, a trade union leader and politi­cian and Par­lia­men­tar­i­an all at once? Weren’t Bas­deo Pan­day, George Weekes, Rafique Shah al­so trade union lead­ers and politi­cians and Par­lia­men­tar­i­ans si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly? Weren’t there many oth­ers in sim­i­lar po­si­tions, sen­a­tors and trade union­ists, like James Man­swell of the PSA or Nathaniel Critchlow and Sel­wyn John of NUGFW,” he asked.

Weath­er­head said he had served on the PSA ex­ec­u­tive for sev­en years as sec­re­tary/trea­sur­er and then Pres­i­dent, both in full-time po­si­tions.

“Dur­ing that time, I main­tained my po­lit­i­cal opin­ion and ac­tiv­i­ty and per­formed my union du­ties. When Bas­deo Pan­day, as PM, agreed to the trade unions’ long-stand­ing de­mand for union rep­re­sen­ta­tion on state boards, the NATUC ex­ec­u­tive adopt­ed the pol­i­cy of nom­i­nat­ing rep­re­sen­ta­tives of unions to boards where the union was the recog­nised union as far as pos­si­ble. I was ap­point­ed to the WASA and NIPDEC boards, where the PSA was one of the rep­re­sent­ing unions. Con­flict of in­ter­est can­not serve two mas­ters was prob­a­bly the cry of some about union rep­re­sen­ta­tion on boards at all and more, par­tic­u­lar­ly as was NATUC’s pol­i­cy,” he said.

Weath­er­head said that at no time dur­ing his sev­en years as a full-time of­fi­cer of the PSA, did he ac­cept the full salary of ei­ther sec­re­tary/trea­sur­er or pres­i­dent.