By Chantalé Fletcher
IN a myriad of colours, thousands of trade union members marched through the streets of Port of Spain on Friday, rejecting the CPO’s 4% increase wage offer.
Gathering at the Brian Lara Promenade from 9 am, the gathering included members of the Joint Trade Union Movement (JTUM), National Trade Union Centre (NATUC), Trinidad and Tobago Nurses Association (TTRNA), Communication Workers Union (CWU), Prisons Service Association, Public Servants Assoication, Trinidad and Tobago Unified Teachers Assoication (TUTTA), along with many others and various activist groups.
The unions had initailly rejected the Chief Personnel Officer (CPO) Daryl Dindial’s 2% increase for the bargaining period of 2014 to 2021 and now a 4% offer.
The procession took place throughout the city of Port of Spain and ended outside the Ministry of Finance at the Financial Comples at the Brian Lara Promenade.
In a brief statement Public Servant Association President, Leroy Baptiste said, “We have a war to win and it could only be won with you.”
Baptiste said what the Government was proposing to settle negotiations will deprive retirees from any increase in pay.
He said, “They do that and in the same breadth, they have fixed themselves and as retirees not only will they have a pension that equals their full salary and all the allowances to the salary as a pension.
“So when Rowley leaves office, he will get the exact pay as a pension that he’s getting as a salary. And they then put into the law, their salary and pension adjusted to be the same as whoever is holding office as the prime minister or ministers at the time.
“If it’s good for the goose, then it’s better for the gander. It is wrong, immoral that a government we place to fix themselves and then come and propose zero for our pensioners, zero for our retirees. We must not let that take place!”
In making reference to the government, Roget said, “It cannot be, it should not and it will not that you employ them, and now they taking away your employment.
“It is time for us to get rid of them. And if we can’t eat, they must not eat. If we can’t be comfortable, they must not be comfortable. And so, we have to do what we have to do.”
Roget also warned there would be more action to come but he would not disclose it.
