TPHL sacks director following sexual harassment claim

SHAL­IZA HAS­SANALI

Se­nior In­ves­tiga­tive Re­porter

Shal­iza.has­[email protected]

Trinidad Pe­tro­le­um Hold­ings Ltd yes­ter­day ter­mi­nat­ed the ser­vices of di­rec­tor Romel Lal­loo, just three months af­ter his ap­point­ment.

No rea­son was giv­en for Lal­loo’s ter­mi­na­tion in a let­ter dat­ed No­vem­ber 24, 2025, by Her­itage.

In a tele­phone in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia last evening, Lal­loo, 71, how­ev­er, said he was false­ly ac­cused of sex­u­al ha­rass­ment by an em­ploy­ee of the com­pa­ny, who made the al­le­ga­tion to a se­nior mem­ber of the board about three weeks ago.

Lal­loo said he re­quest­ed de­tails of the al­le­ga­tion and ad­vised that the em­ploy­ee go to the po­lice.

“I was as­ton­ished that they were mak­ing such an al­le­ga­tion,” he said.

He said no de­tails of the al­le­ga­tion were giv­en to him.

Lal­loo ques­tioned who the al­leged vic­tim was and en­quired where and when the in­ci­dent al­leged­ly took place. This was not pro­vid­ed to him.

He al­so re­port­ed the al­le­ga­tion made against him to the Arou­ca Po­lice Sta­tion on Oc­to­ber 17.

Lal­loo said the board mem­ber promised to make him a po­lit­i­cal em­bar­rass­ment af­ter he be­gan send­ing re­ports and emails and rais­ing ques­tions.

“I do feel very emo­tion­al. The fact is that I went to them and told them how the al­le­ga­tion has been made against me.

“In­stead of in­ves­ti­gat­ing the mat­ter, I have been re­moved on an al­le­ga­tion with­out any in­for­ma­tion as to why I have been re­moved,” Lal­loo said.

“It was a gross in­jus­tice to me. I wish to state that I have nev­er sex­u­al­ly ha­rassed any em­ploy­ee at Her­itage, and I am in­no­cent of any of the ac­cu­sa­tions and al­le­ga­tions made against me. I’m very dis­turbed. I’m de­pressed.”

Lal­loo said he alert­ed three min­is­ters about the al­leged in­ci­dent, but nei­ther of them nor Her­itage saw it fit to in­ves­ti­gate the mat­ter.

On Oc­to­ber 18, he al­so wrote to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­gard­ing the in­ci­dent.

Lal­loo be­gan serv­ing on the board of the en­er­gy com­pa­ny on Au­gust 18, 2025. The ma­jor­i­ty of Her­itage di­rec­tors were ap­point­ed in Ju­ly.

A copy of Lal­loo’s ter­mi­na­tion let­ter, signed by Her­itage’s cor­po­rate sec­re­tary, Joanne Sinanans­ingh, ad­vised that he was re­quired to re­turn all com­pa­ny prop­er­ty in his pos­ses­sion, in­clud­ing his ID, equip­ment, and ma­te­ri­als that as­sist­ed him in his du­ties.

The let­ter al­so in­formed Lal­loo that he was grant­ed ac­cess to con­fi­den­tial and pro­pri­etary in­for­ma­tion re­gard­ing the com­pa­ny and its op­er­a­tions.

“Please be re­mind­ed that you are ex­press­ly pro­hib­it­ed from us­ing this in­for­ma­tion for per­son­al gain or to the detri­ment of the com­pa­ny. You are re­quired to main­tain strict con­fi­den­tial­i­ty of all such in­for­ma­tion in­def­i­nite­ly and not dis­close same to any third par­ty with­out pri­or writ­ten con­sent from the com­pa­ny or as may be re­quired by law.”

The let­ter in­formed Lal­loo that his re­mu­ner­a­tion and any out­stand­ing re­im­burse­ment would be processed in ac­cor­dance with the State En­ter­pris­es Per­for­mance Mon­i­tor­ing Man­u­al up to the date of ter­mi­na­tion.

Her­itage chair­man Kurt Ram­lal did not re­spond to calls last evening. How­ev­er, in re­sponse to a What­sApp mes­sage, Ram­lal ad­vised that we di­rect all ques­tions to En­er­gy Min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mooni­lal.

Mooni­lal, un­der whose purview Her­itage falls, did not re­spond to a What­sApp mes­sage re­gard­ing Lal­loo’s ter­mi­na­tion.

Lal­loo’s ter­mi­na­tion came on the heels of the re­vo­ca­tion of Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny di­rec­tor Dr Ah­mad Khan’s ap­point­ment and Phoenix Park Gas Proces­sors Ltd pres­i­dent Do­minic Ram­per­sad, who was asked to pro­ceed on pre-re­tire­ment leave on No­vem­ber 21, de­spite not hav­ing in­tend­ed to leave the com­pa­ny.