Padarath: UNC ponders legal action on TSTT cyber attack

PRINCES Town MP Barry Padarath says the UNC is prepared to take legal action if necessary to find out the cause of the cyber attack on the Telecommunications Services of TT (TSTT) on October 9.

He made the statement at a news conference at the party's headquarters in Chaguanas on Wednesday.

Speaking in the Senate on November 7, Public Utilities Minister Marvin Gonzales said Government had mandated TSTT's board to do a thorough and independent investigation, and the board had taken steps towards facilitating the start of the probe.

Gonzales said, "Additionally, TSTT is still in the process of evaluating all aspects of the attack, including the validation of all reported information in the public domain, that is the personal data of all our citizens, inclusive of members of the Cabinet and parliamentarians."

That exercise is being done on a customer-by-customer basis.

As the results of the investigation become available, Gonzales promised "to provide further clarity on this ongoing situation to the national community."

Padarath recalled that on different occasions, Gonzales identified March, April and May as possible times when a report on the cyber attack should be ready.

"We are at the end of May 2024 and the Government remains mum on the issue of the report."

Padarath said he has sent freedom of information (FOI) requests to TSTT for the minutes of board meetings about what happened during and after the incident.

To date, he claimed, "The board of TSTT has been pussyfooting on this issue. They have refused to provide the information."

Padarath also claimed that Gonzales has been hostile when asked questions in public about the cyber attack.

While he will continue to submit FOI requests to TSTT to obtain information about the incident, Padarath disclosed another option available to the opposition.

"We have taken a decision that should we not get those board minutes coming out of TSTT through the FOI, we are going to go to the courts."

Padarath said that instruction came directly to him from Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar.

On a separate issue, Padarath claimed the $527,800,000 supplementation being sought for the Public Utilities Ministry in the mid-year review of the 2023/2024 budget was only to pay the salaries of WASA workers.

He said the population could not expect to see any of this money being used to do anything to improve water supplies in their areas.

Repeating UNC claims that Government planned to retrench a large number of WASA employees, Padarath said the money in the supplementation for the ministry would be used to pay the workers' salaries to keep them employed because Government was afraid their retrenchment would cause them to lose next year's general election.

Similarly, he continued, Government's fear of a public backlash ahead of the election was the reason there had been no increases in electricity or water rates.

Gonzales subsequently responded to Padarath on TSTT and WASA.

On the former, he said, "That is what the court is for. He is free to ask the court for any document that is not within my possession."

On the latter, Gonzales said, "The supplementation for WASA is to allow the authority to meet its obligations for payment of salary and associated costs for 2024. Of course, he is aware that he lied to the population last year when he said that there would be mass retrenchment of WASA workers by the Government."

He accused Padarath of not telling the truth about the alleged planned layoffs.