For­mer work­ers of the Cabo Star are call­ing for eq­ui­ty af­ter its re­place­ment, the MV Blue Wave Har­mo­ny, was manned by for­eign sea­far­ers.

More than 20 sea­far­ers, rep­re­sent­ed by the Sea­men and Wa­ter­front Work­ers Trade Union (SWW­TU), staged a protest out­side the T&T Fer­ry Ter­mi­nal in Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day, ac­cus­ing the Gov­ern­ment of sidelin­ing qual­i­fied lo­cal work­ers.

Speak­ing at the protest, SWW­TU ex­ec­u­tive coun­cil mem­ber and sea­far­ers’ rep­re­sen­ta­tive An­tho­ny Alex­is said the union was nei­ther in­formed nor con­sult­ed ahead of the tran­si­tion, de­spite what he de­scribed as a long-stand­ing prac­tice of en­gag­ing the union when­ev­er ves­sels are in­tro­duced to op­er­ate the in­ter-is­land seabridge.