Oilfield Workers’ Trade Union president Ancel Roget has described as “pure madness” the Government’s decision to allow Paria Fuel executives to stay in office while the investigating committee under Shiv Sharma begins its probe into the tragic accident in which four divers died.
Speaking at a media conference at the OWTU’s Paramount Building in San Fernando yesterday, Roget renewed his call for chairman Newman George, general manager Mushtaq Mohammed and terminal operations manager Collin Piper to step down to allow a fair investigation.
Roget said he was not ascribing guilt to anyone but felt that leaving them on the job will be wrong, as they had the power to jeopardise and influence the investigation.
“If it is determined that the management system failed or they had no policies in place, then keeping them on the job will be wrong. Because they can influence having the investigation go one way or another, having them on the job will taint the fairness of the investigations,” Roget charged.
He said the committee must enquire whether a job safety analysis, risk assessment, proper drills and rehearsals and response procedure planning were performed before the job was executed.
He also said the investigation must not be aimed at exonerating anyone.
“Its objective is to find out what happened and put things in place to ensure that such a tragedy never happens again,” he added.
Roget said according to the Occupational Health and Safety (OSH) Act, it was forbidden to remove any material from an accident site without the permission of an OSH inspector.
Holding up a copy of a newspaper report in which Energy Minister Stuart Young said the executives will remain in office, Roget said, “I want to tell the minister that he has started off wrong. If there is to have fairness or the appearance of fairness, you must remove these managers.”
On February 25, divers Kazim Ali Jr, Yusuf Henry, Fyzal Kurban and Rishi Nagassar died while doing underwater maintenance works on a 30-inch diameter pipeline at Paria Fuel’s Berth No 6. Only one diver from the team, Christopher Boodram, was rescued.
The five-member investigating committee headed by civil litigator Sharma will be appointed next week and they will have 45 days to present findings.
Apart from Sharma, the committee will also feature former energy executive Eugene Tiah and subsea specialist Gregory Wilson and two representatives from BP and Shell, who are yet to be named.
—Radhica De Silva
