00:00The Oilfield Workers' Trade Union is back on the Petrachin train, and they're bringing along other trade union counterparts and even some business associations.
00:10While talks are still in the preliminary stage, the Confederation of Regional Business Chambers confirms that plans are afoot to see the Petrachin refinery operationalized once more.
00:21Yesterday was the first time the Confederation held any talks with the union, which is the OWTU, the SWWTU, PFA and the NUGFW.
00:33The talks centered around the restart of the Petrachin refinery, which is to bring back economic prosperity and economic growth to Trinidad and Tobago.
00:43While the OWTU is driving the process, the Confederation is the preferred private sector partner at this time.
00:50They have their plan put in place, which is part of the bid that they have submitted to the government.
00:56They have put together a project plan to start the refinery in phases.
01:02We are the ones supplying some training programs, business modeling programs and strategic planning per unit in order to realize the right kind of rate of return regarding the capital outlay that will be required to put in place to restart the refinery.
01:20This latest development comes as the UNC-led government has stated publicly that it will not honor any arrangement made with the former government and a foreign entity.
01:30However, there is still no word as to the status of that negotiation.
01:34That discussion didn't come up yesterday.
01:39What we do know is that there have been some back-channel discussions regarding the unions and the government.
01:45And such a matter with Oando, that needs to be referred to one of the union representatives who might be better able to deal with that.
01:54We didn't discuss Oando yesterday.
01:55And what about financing for the project?
02:01What I was saying, there is a plan to raise money in the international capital markets by way of maybe 2 billion U.S. for start-up refinery and continuous operations.
02:14In this vein, the Confederation is pushing forward.
02:17We hope by the next three months, we could sign to MOU and go forward with that.
02:23Attempts to get responses from the trade unions were futile.
02:27TV6 News has reached out to the Minister of Energy for the latest update as it concerns negotiations to restart and operate the refinery.
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