Seeking justice in Paria tragedy

IN February, the family and friends of the four divers who died in a pipeline on a Paria Fuel Trading Company work-site in 2022 remembered them with a walk in Couva under the banner: The Paria Platform – A Call for Justice.

It's a call that's reverberated throughout the tragedy from the day it was confirmed that four of the five divers died in Paria's pipeline to the concluding hearing of the Commission of Enquiry into the incident in November 2023, when chairman Jerome Lynch, KC, lamented the short shrift given to the families of the divers in the wake of their loss.

Mr Lynch noted that none of the players involved in the enquiry showed any care, concern or compassion to the victims or their families in his estimation.

He specifically noted that, "It would have been an act of kindness and human decency to have made some kind of ex-gratia payment without accepting any liability at all given to them when they needed it the most."

Since then, talk about compensation has bounced around. In May, Paria issued a press release claiming that it was looking into "all available options" to support the families.

Attorney Prakash Ramadhar, who represents some of the families, has called for ex-gratia payments to all the families in November 2023.

Astonishingly, while making closing arguments for the company before the commission in January 2023, Paria's lead counsel, Gilbert Peterson, SC, declared it had done all it could to help the families of the four divers.

"There is no compensatory measure that could be done to these families," he said. "The loss of their loved ones is irreplaceable."

So with the greatest of respect and reverence to the families, some of whom had lost their primary breadwinner, the company did nothing.

In February, the OWTU branch president Christopher Jackman and family members met with DPP Roger Gaspard after the families requested information on his deliberation of the commission's report and recommendations.

It was, Mr Jackman noted, the first time a person in public office had consulted with them.

Their second meeting with a public officer didn't go as well. The Prime Minister met with the families in March, bracketed by legal defence as the AG and Energy Minister sat beside him, but the formalities left the families disappointed.

Paria's persistent dawdling on the question of support for the affected families is likely to hinge on the issue of official responsibility for the fatalities.

On July 10, the first step to a formal assignment of legal liability for the incident began with the OSHA charges laid against LMCS head Kazim Ali Snr, whose own son died in the tragedy, Paria's general manager Mushtaq Mohammed and operations manager Colin Piper by magistrate Alicia Chankar in a virtual hearing. The case will resume on September 11.

Justice has been delayed for too long while these families suffer.