Immigration Detention officers claim no salaries since November

APPROXIMATELY 30 officers assigned to the Immigration Detention Centre (IDC), in Aripo, claim they have not been paid since last November.

And they are calling on the detention centre’s management and the Ministry of National Security, under whose purview the facility falls, to “come clean” on the issue.

The affected officers include detention supervisors and corporals.

The centre is used as a holding facility to keep illegal immigrants. In the past, inmates have protested against the poor conditions at the facility and there have been instances where some have escaped.

“All of them are special reserve policemen who were on contract but the contracts ended. We understand they are now waiting on the Parliament and CPO (Chief Personnel Officer) to deal with renewals,” an officer told Sunday Newsday. He spoke on the condition of anonymity as he feared victimisation.

He said other categories of workers, such as maintenance staff and emergency medical personnel, are also affected.

“We were getting a lot of cross talk because people casting the blame at everybody else foot.

The centre’s security management, including the operations and administrations manager, are saying it not their fault. They cannot give you a definitive answer.”

He said some of the officers, who are over the age of 60, also have not been paid.

“But they are coming out to work and are working diligently. How can they do something like that?”

To add insult to injury, he claimed managers are advising officers who cannot turn out to work owing to lack of money to “take a day.”

The officer added, “So the management here not trying, at any point in time, to create a comfortable environment for the workers.”

He also accused them of hiding information.

“They not passing on information and that keeps going on for months and everybody passing the buck.”

He said employees in the centre’s accounts department and that of the Ministry of National Security are also not accepting blame for the non-payment of salaries.

“So everybody just running people up and down without giving a definitive word as to exactly what is what.

“Talking to them makes no sense in certain instances because you are trying to show them certain things that could assist in alleviating the blame game but they still not receptive to common sense arguments.”

The officer said some workers are also experiencing delays in getting their gratuity payments.

“Some people are taking as much as nine months to get their gratuities and even this the management cannot explain. All they are getting is rhetoric and semantics. Like nobody wants to bell the cat.”

He accused the IDC of “moving like a law unto themselves.

“The ministry needs to deal with this because somebody playing the fool.”

The IDC was established in 2009 to deal with foreign nationals who breach immigration regulations and are living in Trinidad and Tobago illegally.

Calls seeking a response from officials of the IDC and the Ministry of National Security were not returned.