Young dismisses 'Phantom' claims

NATIONAL Security Minister Stuart Young on Wednesday rejected claims that two Cape Class patrol boats being constructed by Australian shipbuilder Austal for the Coast Guard are being built in Vietnam and will be unsuitable for maritime security operations.

The claims were made by an unidentified masked man called "The Phantom" who spoke at a news conference held by the Polygraph Committee at Victoria Suites in Port of Spain on Wednesday.

Committee members claimed the Phantom's identity could not be revealed for security reasons.

Former UNC candidate Lennox Smith, at the start of the briefing, said the committee was a group of activists not aligned to any political party.

Other members are Garth Christopher, UNC activist Brian G Stone and consultant Michael Kerr.

The Phantom claimed that two Cape Class patrol boats were being built in Vietnam, not at Austal's shipyard at Henderson in Western Australia.

Austal started operations at a shipyard in the port city of Vung Tau in Vietnam last March. According to the company's website, the opening of the Vung Tau shipyard was part of Austal's strategy to expand its manufacturing operations for commercial vessels. As of March, a total of 201 workers were employed there.

The Phantom claimed the vessels would be of inferior quality because they were being built in Vietnam. He also alleged there were reports of Cape Class patrol boats being defective and that there was no procurement process for them.

Young said, "The Opposition's continued desperation and attacks on Government's implemented decision to procure two state-of-the-art Austal Cape Class vessels is noteworthy."

He recalled that last year, Government sent then Defence Force Chief of Staff Commodore Hayden Pritchard and the Coast Guard's chief engineer to Australia to evaluate the vessels.

"Based on their recommendation these vessels have been procured," Young said.

Young remembered the UNC scrapped the offshore patrol vessel contract signed by the Patrick Manning administration with BAE Systems of the UK then hustled, in its final year, to buy a Chinese vessel and vessels from Dutch shipbuilder Damen which were unsuitable for TT's waters.

"The disinformation being spread by the UNC operators is a clear indication that the Opposition does not want to properly protect our borders, the same way they left them open from 2010 to 2015," he declared.

Young said Government looks forward to the delivery of the Cape Class vessels and "will continue to work to protect our borders."

In a statement last July, Austal said the vessels would be built at its Henderson shipyard. The order for the vessels is approximately AU$100 million, plus a multi-year ongoing maintenance and support package.

Austal is to establish a service centre in TT to support the two new vessels, fast patrol boats previously purchased from Austal and any additional vessels requiring maintenance as determined by the government.

The two Cape Class vessels are expected to be delivered to the Coast Guard in mid-2020.