The International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) urges the Government of Papua New Guinea to rethink the decision to award 25-year contracts at the country’s two biggest ports to International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI).
Over the past month, global port operator ICTSI has been criticized over labour violations, poor safety standards, and insufficient managerial oversight to ensure productive industrial relations, and compliance with local laws and international labour conventions, ITF claims.
“The ITF, alongside the Maritime International Federation, is calling on the Minister of Transport, Hon. Wesley Nukundj, to intervene and urgently convene a meeting of stakeholders – including union and landowner representatives – to find a solution to the current crisis,” ITF’s president Paddy Crumlin said.
Further, the Papua New Guinea Maritime and Transport Workers Union, an affiliate of the ITF, says that more than 1,000 jobs will be lost at the ports and in associated industries due to the contracts awarded to ICTSI, as they believe that ICTSI intends “to replace workers with a mixture of casual, outsourced labour and Filipino workers under the guise of mentors.”
In addition, there are significant concerns about how the entry of ICTSI into the PNG port sector will impact on landowner groups, the county’s domestic coastal shipping network and local communities.
“Both the Government of PNG and ICTSI need to answer some serious, unanswered questions…And the impact of ICTSI’s entry on the viability of PNG’s domestic coastal shipping network and implications that ICTSI’s predatory pricing structures will have on the costs of goods in the country need to be addressed,” added Mr. Crumlin.
