By Prior Beharry
THE Chief Executive Officer of Caribbean Airlines (CAL) Garvin Madera has overstepped his boundaries by saying that doctors will be summoned to testify in an Industrial Court matter against pilots.
In a statement on Friday, Rudranath Indarsingh said, “I condemn the bullying statements made by Garvin Medera, who has overstepped his boundary as Chief Executive Officer at Caribbean Airlines, who apart from failing at his job to properly manage our national airline, now trains his guns on the doctors of our country.
“Mr Medera’s statement that doctors could be summoned before the courts to account for the recommendation of sick leave to pilots is an attempt to intimidate pilots, other CAL workers and doctors, and to deflect from the abysmal failure he has been in the role of CEO, and he now seeks to make doctors into scapegoat in the ongoing standoff between pilots and CAL.”
After an alleged sickout by pilots on Sunday, CAL successfully got an injunction in the Industrial Court against the Trinidad and Tobago Airline Pilots Association (TTALPA) to have pilots back to work. About 60 flights had to be cancelled.
Indarsingh said there was no legal basis upon which a doctor can be summoned before the courts to breach patient/doctor confidentiality.
He said, “Mr Medera is fast, out of place, and jetting away into wistful, deflective stupidity.
“Further, Mr Medera’s statement stands to create a fear amongst staff by indirectly intimidating any and all CAL workers who may need to access legitimate sick leave, as they are entitled to so do.
“Mr Medera needs to focus on the fact that pilots lost such confidence in the negotiating process with Mr Medera’s management that they had to resort to such protest action.
“It is the failure of Mr Medera’s leadership in the negotiation process that caused last week’s loss of fifteen million taxpayers’ dollars, the grave displacement of the lives and wellbeing of passengers, and a strong blow to our airline’s reputation.”
Indarsingh said under the PNM, CAL took the regrettable decision to sell its rights at the Heathrow Terminal in London, England.
He said, “It acquired the financially- strapped Air Jamaica despite the advice of senior experts in the industry.
“Citizens and stakeholders in our sister isle continue to lament the mismanagement of the critical air bridge between Trinidad and Tobago and the impact of such mismanagement on Tobago’s economy.
“It is unfathomable that while CAL boasts of adding more flights to its route, it seems unable to negotiate properly with the pilots who have to serve those said routes.”
