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OWTU SPEAKS 2007 03 07

The OWTU Speaks had taken just a short respite from its regular airings so as to not compete with the Carnival revelry.  But it seems that the mas continue even as we speak today.  Welcome and good evening.  There was the time, not long ago, when even their pious physiognomies suggested judiciousness in their approach to the crucial functions to which they were appointed.  But not so today -, regrettably -, not so today.  What we see now is not piety, nor is it judicial!  This is not uprightness in here – this is not sound dealings in our institution – this is madness!  And where are we going? St. Ann’s!  Could the President restore some sanity and good order?  That is another conundrum.  How do responsible people – assuming that they are playing with a full deck – how do they make accusations which shake the foundations of our institutions and systems, put doubt – about the profoundness of the institution and the integrity of our heads and then decide, unilaterally, that they will back out from the prosecution of alleged offenders.  That is madness and it does shame every serious and proud Trinbagonian!  Like London Bridge, everything national – from the airline to our safety and security systems – everything is falling down, and there seems nobody whom we can trust anymore with anything!  The systems seem constricted and our chiefs constipated.  We remember the joke in the Red Indian Western movie when the tenderfoot scout went in search of the ‘medicine man’ for a cure to the Chief’s ailment.  The satire here is not meant to disrespect the already disrespected but it seems an appropriate description for the messy crap that passes for serious business in Trinidad and Tobago today:

The scout said to the medicine man – “Big chief no shit!”  Medicine man gave him a potion of bango root, ditae payee, fisic nut, pony urine and macaquel oil to administer to the chief.  After three days, the tender foot returned to the medicine man – “Big chief no shit” – he said.  Another more concentrated potion of the purgative was dispensed by the medicine man.  The next day the scout went to the medicine man and reported “Big shit, no chief.”

We pray that an intervention be made soon enough to excuse those who have been dispensing various potions of debilitating substances to our body politic before all of Trinidad and Tobago ends up a big cesspit.

What do we now say to and about the many other witnesses who may be intimidated against giving evidence in serious criminal matters before the courts?

Which witness, seen as equal to all before the law, is allowed to determine whether a mother goes forward or is discontinued?  Or is it true that it is a system of different strokes for different folks?

Good evening and have a peaceful night.  I am Errol McLeod for the OWTU Speaks.

O.W.T.U. SPEAKS   2007.03.09

Good evening and welcome again to the O.W.T.U. SPEAKS.

The imbroglio involving the highest levels of our justice system and the executive will take a lot of doing before it dissipates, so today we take our second salvo of criticism against those persons and circumstances that have brought us to this shameful state.  We hold no brief for anyone but the best interest of Trinidad and Tobago.

That best interest is eroded each time appointees to positions of leadership seek to encase themselves in authority and abandon their responsibility for the defence and preservation of institution.

In another sovereign jurisdiction from which we seem to have copied everything but the principled and virtuous, not only would the main characters in the shame have walked but even the government may have fallen.  And these would have been as a natural consequence to those people having ultimate subscription to their institutions as the most important pillars of their state.  To them you see, the officer may do wrong and demit but the office is to be preserved and hallowed.

Now, we are conscious-some of us-that comments such as have just been made, would provoke old debates about who we go put if the one set of malfeasants now encased in authority was defrocked and removed.  Who we go put – that other set that was removed due to corruption just the other day?  Well – one response is that there are still honest and well meaning men and women and youth to be found in Trinidad and Tobago.

Another response and perhaps more fundamental, is that we have for too long avoided the what we should build and develop question for the divisive ‘who we should put question!

What institutions, what kind of society do we want to build and on what ethical and moral antecedence would they be founded?  That is the question!  Not who!  It is sound institutions and systems which must govern man’s behaviour and conduct in his relationship with others.  It is not man governing over, defiling and abusing institutions and systems!

2020 will leave us worse off if we meet it in our present nasty, brutish and short state.  It is wholly unacceptable for the actions or more appropriately the inaction and/or silence of top officials and chiefs to parallel and compound that of confessed criminals who changed their stories and refused to testify before the courts, and police officers forgetting their lines and prose and thus allowing a continuum of criminal intimidation.

When the public is alarmed as it certainly has been in recent times by the uncomplimentary happenings in our justice system, what support do we garner for confidence and trust in ourselves as being able to superintend justice in our local and regional jurisdictions?

One week ago today, the Caribbean Court of Justice hosted an important Conference which dealt with the Caribbean Single Market and Economy and its Legal Implications as the over-arching theme of that two-day conference.  Such items as the Original Jurisdiction of the Court; CSME, CCJ and the Private Sector; the Relationship between International Law and Caribbean Domestic Law; WTO and GATTs; Competition Policy, the CCJ and the Law; the European Court of Justice among others were discussed and distilled.  But more that that, the full panel of Justices of the CCJ were in attendance and they to our credit, presented a collective knowledge, experience, jurisprudence and commitment to our Caribbean region such as must make us proud and able to close the Circle of Independence.

The aberration now engaging us in Trinidad and Tobago does not help in the process but it must not stop the march.

Have a good evening and a peaceful and reflective weekend.

I am Errol Mc Leod for the O.W.T.U. SPEAKS!

OWTU SPEAKS 2007-03-19

We found it necessary to improve the frequency of our programme broadcast by changing to another frequency.  Welcome to the OWTU Speaks on 90.1 fm.

We start with a hot one ‘systems overload at T & TEC’.

The dismissal of an employee – any employee – is never the news that this Union likes to hear.  The report on the firing of the Corporate Communications Manager at the Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission last Monday however, was not bad news.  It was just a matter of time.  High flying idiots who are over owed by their own fancies are invariable driven into and doomed by the villainy of their own indiscretions.  It is also regrettable that so much of what guides recruitment in the State sector is influenced by nepotism and narrow party considerations than on the basis of a meritocracy and transparent policies.

We were deliberate and wise when the Union advised those four conscientious female workers on T & TEC’s Corporate Communications Department who were allegedly harassed and discriminate against, that they should comply with management’s instructions to alternative postings while the Union pursued their complaints against an obnoxious sow’s-ass of a personality who was accused of terrorizing them.

Their Union was confident that they would be vindicated.  We have always held firmly to the view – and it is becoming a truism – we hold the view that to everyone truant worker that is identified, there are no fewer than three damn fool errant managers in the establishment.  And it is most unfortunate that these gargoyles are anointed in the Corporate Communications functions of our state enterprises sector.  We had deliberately avoided public airing on the state of Affairs at the Commission’s PR Department and the Executive Management’s apparent helplessness in addressing the incidences of the utility’s image being rudely disrespected and embarrassed.

Indeed, we were coming to the view that there were some persons, who, because of personal relationships and political connections, were untouchable – even as they were seen to be low classed, lewd, ludicrous and detestable.  We are very reliably informed that this firing did not wrench a tear – no woman, no cry.

It is not requiring a science degree for anyone to understand that the he, the she or the shim who must paint and promote an organisation’s image must himself be of a decently image and ought not to open his fly or lift his skirt unashamedly in public.  And really, the standards which inform proper behaviour ought to equally apply if one is distributing an electricity supply, refining oil or selling transportation fuels.

Our organisations’ public images are really a reflection of our internal relationships.  It is something perhaps like our country’s foreign policy – it will not present a healthy image abroad if internally the domestic situation is rotten.

Let the contaminants go! Let the high fliers – worthless comperes and macomeres – take their unnaturalness elsewhere!

Have a safe evening and continue to enjoy the uncertainties of world class cricket!

I am Errol Mc Leod of OWTU Speaks!

OWTU SPEAKS 2007 03 21

Even the most villainous must be seen to be fairly treated before the law.  And yesterday’s decision is to be applauded as a very positive step toward restoring the fair-minded public’s confidence in the administration of justice in Trinidad and Tobago.

Good evening and welcome to the OWTU Speaks!  Today we condole with the family and relatives of one of Trinidad and Tobago’s and the Caribbean’s finest sons.  We mourn the passing of Lloyd Best.  To the OWTU, Lloyd had come a bit late and has left too soon!  Just about two years ago when he addressed a closed symposium hosted by us, Dr. Best said to this commentator:- “PG, your people are getting to know and understand me, late in the day.”  I am appreciating so much more now, the weight of the contents of that brief statement.

As an economist, sociologist, philosopher and political scientist, Dr. Best played a remarkable innings scoring seventy three (73).  But he was such a colourful and prolific stroke player that every human development enthusiast in the Caribbean Pavilion wished that Lloyd had remained at the wicket to score a maco ton of runs.

We are sad that he is gone.  We came to really know him only yesterday but our memories of him will last.

The OWTU’s flags will fly at half mast from Friday until Lloyd’s funeral on Sunday.  We now take a peek at some other matters of the day:-

Are we noticing the disenchantment and near disgust of the people – ordinary people – where they live and where they work?

Value Added Tax is removed from certain necessary everyday items of food, and instead of purchases spending 15% less on these items; they are made to pay 25% more.  If villagers in government-forgotten communities do not block the roads and burn tyres and old fridges in protest, they will get no water, no garbage collection and no road repairs and drainage maintenance.  Everything, like London Bridge, is falling down – from justice in chief to Magistrate in cross-examination.  And at political level the vampires are getting their house in order to suck more blood on the one hand and on the other, Ali Baba and his forty sycophants will try their cunning for another opportunity to gorge themselves at the public’s trough.  Both the crooks and the mooks have feasted themselves as though the famine cometh at dawn.  They fixed themselves handsomely and well and gave Granny and nenen a paltry $200.00  But the people who work – the ordinary people’s economic value added contributions are frustrated by the procrastinations of a CPO  whose own remuneration and perks have been adequately fixed, and a PSNC – i.e. – a Public Sector Negotiating Committee comprising five ministers all of whom fixed themselves.  Think it easy!  So, the workers of NP will be mobilized to do what serious workers must do for Bread and Justice.  And the Technical & Administrative workers employed at the University of the West Indies will be mobilized to do what serious workers must do for Bread and Justice.  And the Electricity workers – T & TEC and Power Gen will be mobilized to do what organized energy workers can do for Bread and Justice.

And if the long suffering Hilton workers and the TSTT workers are mobilized and we all join in common struggle, we will cause the authorities to put Corporate Trinidad & Tobago’s house in order and so create an equitable distribution of the Bread and an environment and atmosphere of equal justice and peace!

I am Errol McLeod for the OWTY Speaks!

OWTU SPEAKS  2007-03-23

Good evening and welcome to OWTU Speaks!  We repudiate and dismiss out of hand, Mr. Manning’s outrageous unprovoked, idle and puerile chatter about the country’s image being damaged by “irresponsible trade union activity”.

It is not difficult to discern which Trade Union Manning is pointing his contaminated finger at when he supinely bares himself before the Multinational czars to whom he has ceded much of the control over the exploitation of our energy resources.

Mr. Manning does not possess the moral authority to point any finger at the OWTU and we will never be reduced to genuflecting before him.  We know too that he remembers well, our identifying him as Amoco’s Pinocchio back in 1983 when he held the Energy portfolio in the Chamber’s Administration.  We are not at all moved, surprised or disappointed that like bo-peep, he would hide and then again suddenly reappear with the venom and vindictiveness.  Still, he does not affect us as much as his dotish talk offends good sense.  And had we not ascribed respect to the office of Prime Minister, we would tell Patrick Manning that he is impertinent and his charge of irresponsible activity, ill-directed.

We have nothing to be ashamed of Mr. Manning, and whenever we took action – even disruptive industrial action – it was done with discipline and in non-violent ways, but more than that our trade union activity has generally been in defence of the workers’ and the national interest before the transnational companies’ interest.  Yes, Mr. Manning, it is that which identified you as Amoco’s Pinocchio back the and which brought your neocolonialism in sharp conflict with modern third-world nationalism.  On those occasions when we took action against our state-owned companies, we were struggling against corruption, nepotism, mismanagement and the multinational influenced anti-worker policies of our neo-colonial bosses – political and corporate industrial.  Indeed, you – Mr. Manning, opportunistically or by other circumstances, supported our strike action taken against, Trintoc, Trinmar and Trintopec in 1989 when you were humbled into the position of minority opposition leader skating on a thin plinth of political isolation.  Do you remember playing cards at the strike camp with hacks, one of whom graduated to ‘hatchet man’ in Petrotrin’s team of prosecutors, judges and executioners?  Do you remember condemning the administration then as anti-worker, capitalist exploiters?  How did we affect the country’s image then? And what ever your response Sir, measure it against the serious indentations caused by the imbroglios in our justice system, the spiral in crime and criminal activity, the many instances of corruption and malfeasance in the conduct of our public affairs, and the haven which we seem to have cultivated for the barons of guns and drugs.

Mr. Manning is also hypocritical when he postures as being supportive of the reorganization and restructuring of our State Enterprise energy Companies into one sensible, divisionalised, effective amalgamated entity.

Manning has today come around to the common sense which he criticized and against which he wailed in 1988/1989.  Ask his special adviser Herbert Atwell who as Minister of Energy then was the government’s sponsor of the proposal to restructure the State Energy Companies.  Manning opposed than and vehemently opposed all suggestions of same during his administration 1991-1995.  We will not forget Manning’s assertion that the head of such a Super-state Energy company will feel as powerful as the Prime Minister and may threaten our constitutional arrangements.

Take your feet out of your mouth Mr. Manning except if you aim to crush the rocks in your head.

I am Errol Mc Leod for the OWTU Speaks.

OWTU SPEAKS 2007 03 28

Mr. Speaker, the whole thing stinks! It stinks from the ratoon to the Commonwealth Secretariat.  The Lion defecated in his lair and behaves as though he has an inalienable right to the monkeys and baboons allowing him easy passage to pollute and contaminate the chamber.  Good evening and welcome to the OWTU Speaks.

It is detestable – the manner in which institutions is being brought into disrepute and subjected to the influence and control of a moral man.  Nothing, absolutely nothing wholesome and worthwhile is being bequeathed by the and wretched currently in positions of national leadership.  Old folks had a notion that a republic was not a good state.  Indeed, some of them used to say that since we became a republic, everybody felt that he could do what he wanted, how he wanted, when he wanted and without concern for others.

Every old lion and toothless tiger think that they have licence to mash up the place.  The long time bad john was a burro who mistook fear for honour, and it was only the most asinine and insecure who cower in fear of the badjohn.

There is another anecdote:  the closer crapaud gets to expiration, the greater his desire to smell motor car tyres. 

But really?  Is it an honour to be feared?  No! Not so! That has to be bush-lion thinking.  We should think that there is honour in being respected, trusted. And, honesty, fairness, integrity are some of the magnets which attract respect and trust.  We hold the considered view that the Honourable Speaker’s magnanimity was too profuse and ill directed.

Which other ‘stranger’ could have forced himself upon and be accommodated in the front bench of either side of the House?  Whether old lion or cub, if one is not a member of the House, he has no greater privilege than a ‘stranger’.

There is another lesson to be learnt:  It goes as follows:  He who exalts himself shall be humbled, and he who is humble shall be exalted.

One of tour most serious drawbacks is the polarisation of our people by political lions and horsemen who, for their own narrow ambitions and interests, would do all to separate their pride of the plains from the teams of the other tribe in the foothills and urban centres.

The decadence in our national politics will only be ameliorated where Lion and horseman are retired and are off the scene, they do their parties no good holding on as Lion King and equestrian on the tribes respectively.

The question, Mr. Speaker and Honourable members, is :  Be it resolved that this Honourable House repudiates the shame and disrepute into which it has fallen and that steps be taken to fumigate its chamber from the putrid smell of decay in the lair on the one did the horse pen on the other.

As many as are of that opinion say “aye”.  As many as are of the contrary opinion say 'nay’.  The ayes have it!  Have a safe evening.  I am Errol Mc Leod for the OWTU Speaks.

OWTU SPEAKS 2007 03 30

Good evening and welcome to the OWTU Speaks and very special greetings to the Spiritual Baptist community on the occasion of Shouter Baptist Liberation Day 11^th Anniversary Celebrations.  Yesterday we had a big laugh at the hypocritical clowns who believed that the erection of police barriers and the posting of frustrated policemen outside Whitehall would have shut out and prevented the voices of those who carry out for justice, bread and peace, from the view and hearing of those who shout law and order.  The hypocrites are representing today the same policies and the sponsors of those policies which oppressed, repressed, outlawed and alienated the shouter Baptists in our immediate pre internal self-government and independence period.

Barriers were also erected against the Shouter Baptists and the Colonial police were ever ready to beat and arrest them.  And the politicians then and now always instructed the police to ensure law and order and prevent the mombo jumbos and rabble rousers’ disturbance of the peace – the colonial and neo-colonial master’s peace. But the people – the ordinary people, oppressed and unemployed – had long come to realize that:  Any man, be he Prime Minister or Executive President, Governor or High Priest; Chief Magistrate of chief of the Constabulary; Parliamentary Lion or toothless constituency tiger representatives – any man who shouts law and order in response to the peoples’ cry for bread and justice – just examine his files and you are sure to find the secret record of a common crook.

Yesterday, from 9.30 a.m. to 1.30 p.m., the police mounted barriers failed to stifle the expressions of the hundreds who protested the Public Sector Negotiating Committee’s frustration of the bargaining process which addresses Salary. , Wage and other terms and conditions of employment affecting employees of Hilton Trinidad; the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine Campus and Mount Hope Hospital; the National Petroleum Marketing Company, NP, the Power Generation Company Limited; Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission, Telecommunication Services of Trinidad and Tobago and sundry other issues.  The establishment’s attempts to muzzle and muffle our expressions of protest failed as miserably as the colonial attempts to stifle the formation and registration of Trade Unions and the religious and spiritual expressions of the Shouter Baptists.  We are sure that the Prime Minister and his Cabinet heard as from across the road outside Whitehall.  They heard us and they saw us even if the will pretend like Mr. Manning to be insulated against and immune to being affected by the cries and protests of the ordinary.  And they will see and hear us again for as long as the issues affecting us remain unaddressed and unresolved.

None of us among the workers of Hilton Trinidad, or NO or UWI or TSTT or Power Gen or T & TEC or Petrotrin or Fire Services or Estate Police or Prisons, gathered outside Whitehall yesterday is associated with actions deemed to bringing the justice system into disrepute or to frustrate the functioning of the House of Representatives, or to exacerbating the crime spiral or to fuelling inflation or to engendering civil disobedience and making the country ungovernable.  Neither are we talking opportunity to engage in election politics as claimed by Minister Ken Valley.  Valley can’t help but be an obnoxious buffoon.  For us, struggle knows no season – election season, political mating season, silly season or otherwise!  We demand equity and fair treatment.  We will accept nothing less.  And we will respond appropriately to each development as it comes.  Happy Baptist Holiday.

I am Errol Mc Leod for OWTU Speaks.