Since 2010 the All Trinidad General Workers’ Trade Union (ATGWTU ) was trying to negotiate with the UNC over rent issues of the Rienzi Complex in Couva but the party had ignored the union over the years.
So said the union's president, Nirvan Maharaj, to members of the media during a protest at the Ministry of Agriculture, St Clair, yesterday.
Saying there was “a lot of misconception” taking place Maharaj added: “Since 2010 the union would have been writing to the UNC to engage with us for a lease arrangement.
“The party so far has failed to so do. In fact the party has treated the union with utter disdain and contempt and has never once sat down or responded to any correspondence the union would have sent them concerning a lease arrangement.”
Since 2010 the party has been on a month-to-month contract with the union.
“The party had never corresponded with us officially by documentation. I could provide all the documentation to the media that the union would have written to the UNC since 2010. I don’t think the UNC could provide any documentation to the media concerning that issue,” Maharaj said.
He added he was shocked when the UNC’s chairman, David Lee, said he had approached the union to negotiate a lease arrangement.
The party is now looking for a new headquarters after being served notice to leave the place it has called home for the past 27 years.
The UNC had said the monthly rental fee of $25,000 as proposed was too much.
However, Maharaj said he was baffled by that.
“I don’t understand why they could be saying this at all. As an incumbent political party in Government, at the end of the day people fail to understand that before 2010 the UNC enjoyed the use of Rienzi Complex free of charge.
“They were actually paying a stipend of $2,500. When we raised the rent to $12,000 they refused to negotiate with us but they paid the rent and out of the historical dynamics of the past we allowed a certain leeway because we hoped that the matter would come to some sort of resolution,” Maharaj added.
He said he attended a meeting last month which lasted 15 minutes with Lee. Maharaj said the party said it was not prepared to pay the increase and that it would be looking for another place.
“Having no correspondence from them I had no choice but to issue that eviction notice,” Maharaj added.
Rienzi Complex was named after former labour leader Adrian Cola Rienzi. He was the founder of the Oilfields Workers’ Trade Union and the then All Trinidad Sugar Estates and Factory Workers Union.
Lee, in a release, had said the union was reluctant to provide the UNC with a long-term lease and subsequently indicated its wish for the party to leave the premises without cause.