By Adrian Boodan
http://legacy.guardian.co.tt/archives/2006-10-12/news9.html
Minister of Agriculture Jarrette Narine has promised a full investigation into Tuesday’s accident in which a worker lost a leg at the Sugarcane Feeds Centre (SFC).
Tadil Hosein, of Main Road, Longdenville, was operating foraging equipment at the Pokhor Road, Longdenville, operations of the SFC when his leg got into the blades of the machine.
He was taken to the Chaguanas Health Centre and subsequently transferred to the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex at Mount Hope, where he underwent surgery on Tuesday night.
Following the mishap, the All Trinidad Sugar and General Workers’ Trade Union (ATSGWTU), the body representing the 75 SFC employees, instructed union members to stop work until health and safety requirements at the centre were met.
Operations at the SFC were shut down yesterday, when representatives of the ATSGWTU met with Narine at the compound.
Rudy Indarsingh, head of the union, said the ATSGWTU would also be launching its own investigation into the mishap.
Indarsingh said Narine agreed to step up health and safety measures at the 30-year-old research facility and to look into the immediate appointment of a human resource officer to fill a post which has been vacant since the first quarter of this year.
Indarsingh said Hosein and his family would also be receiving counselling while the ATSGWTU would be calling on the SFC to pay his medical bills, as well as the cost of his rehabilitation.
Indarsingh said the union has proposed that the victim be fitted with an artificial limb.
As to the SFC’s 30th anniversary celebrations, Indarsingh said the ATSGWTU would not try to stop the activity at the SFC since the union is all about promoting the growth of T&T’s agricultural sector.
