(Trinidad Guardian) – This country will be sourcing crude oil supplies from Colombia and Russia after Petrotrin workers refused to berth a tanker that arrived in T&T waters on October 18 from Gabon due to concerns over the Ebola virus. The action of the workers, represented by the Oilfields Workers’ Trade Union (OWTU), forced Petrotrin to use scab labour to offload the MV Overseas Yellowstone, which had arrived at Petrotrin’s Pointe-a-Pierre base since last week with $.5 billion worth of oil.
News of the decision came via international news reports, in-cluding the reputable Bloomberg, which quoted Energy Minister Kevin Ramnarine as saying he had halted oil purchases from Gabon which had been T&T’s only African supplier of crude oil in the past 20 months.
The vessel eventually docked late on Tuesday last using outsourced tugs and labour, he also said. “The situation is dynamic and we will review if need be,” Ramnarine said in an e-mail response to questions on the issue posed by Bloomberg.com. “It should, however, be noted that there is no Ebola outbreak in Gabon.”
The stand-off has resulted in losses for state-owned Petrotrin, which was forced to reduce throughput to the refinery from 110,000 barrels per day (bpd) to 80,000 bpd because it could not immediately get the 750,000 barrels on board the tanker.
The company had said without the supply of crude it could have been forced to shut down operations at the refinery which can take as much as two weeks to restart.
Gabon is not among the five west African countries from where passengers have been banned from entering T&T due to an outbreak of Ebola but OWTU president general Ancel Roget said at a news conference that did not matter, since ships normally used crews from other countries. “Therefore any threat or any exposure to the Ebola virus would put at risk not only the employee but the home, family, community and therefore it is in the national interest that we call on the company to put in place the necessary protocols in the interest of the workers at Pointe–a-Pierre,” the union leader said.
Roget said given that the ship had visited other ports, it was possible that someone on board could be carrying the Ebola virus for which there is no known cure. Gabon, which has had Ebola outbreaks in 2001-2002, 1996-1997 and 1994, is not among countries currently experiencing cases of Ebola and is not among the four countries on the banned list announced by the Government last week. The virus has killed more than 4,500 people in the current outbreak, mostly in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
In an immediate response, Roget described the company’s response to the workers’ complaints as “foolish.” Speaking while taking part in the candlelight vigil for Highway re-route Movement leader Dr Wayne Kublalsingh outside the Office of the Prime Minister, St Clair, on Wednesday night, Roget said the workers’ problem was not where the vessels were coming from but the company’s failure to institute rigorous screening for all ships entering the port and lack of proper protocols.
He said: “They do not understand and appreciate that they are placing the nation at risk because these workers live in communities and if they are exposed they will expose their families and friends.
“They are not claiming that there is someone ill with Ebola on the vessel but they are saying that they run the risk because ships come from all over the world at that port and they cannot trust the word of the captain and crew of those vessels.
“Those ships they bunker out in the open seas and even though they may not come from west Africa you don’t know who they would have come in contact with on the seas.”
He also claimed the current procedure being used by the company and the Health Ministry was outdated and inefficient. “It is an age-old procedure where they send someone, who is not a medical doctor, on board the ship. He checks the ship’s records and then gives them clearance.
There is no type of interaction with the crew to determine whether they exhibit any symptoms,” Roget said.
