To all who read this letter, I feel need to hear both sides of the story in order to understand what actually transpired in this department at NCL during this time.
(Please refer to -"Norwegian Cruise Line Complaints - HARASSMENT, PREJUDICE AND EXPLOITATION")
The first paragraph states that I was dismissed when in fact I was never dismissed because I instead resigned my position to travel out of the country to assist my wife with the birth of our baby. I never learned of this accusation made against me until sometime after I left NCL. If any discussion about my performance was addressed by anyone at NCL it was not addressed with my involvement. If in fact there were any reason to dismiss me from NCL at no time was I notified, approached or otherwise informed of any investigation regarding my performance. To my knowledge my superior management team was pleased with my performance. I at this time had been transferred to the Sky to assist in the refurbishment of the vessel, the installation of surveillance cameras in the re-installment of the casino and an upgrade of the Surveillance system from analog to digital.
My actual complaint here is against the website posting this disgruntled employee’s letter without first conducting any research as to the validity to the claim. The accusation that I would be prejudice against a black man from South Africa when I myself am a man of the same color is in my opinion insane. If the truth were to be told I and Mark Satiya had many conversations on the differences between what goes on in South Africa and what goes on here in America. These conversations were for the benefit of my knowledge and information of Africa. If Mr. Satiya took these conversations in a negative light my intentions were to learn more from someone who actually lives there what South Africa was really like, and even more so what it was like from a black man’s perspective. We here in America do not have the entire story as we get our information from the American media.
Working with Mr. Satiya on a professional level was indeed a challenge. He did have a quiet demeanor about him which suggests that he would go along with most anything; and truthfully at the time of our connection the ship being in dry dock and no real solid operation in place at the time this was what was needed at the startup. In the beginning there were uncountable issues while the Casino was being built and the Surveillance room was being refurbished. For the most part the beginning weeks were full of plenty “do as you like” time and meetings of what was to come. For Mr. Satiya to insinuate that I greeted him with a negative statement that “the last south African lasted a short time with me” again was absurd. I do however recall mentioning to the operatives that the previous ship I worked on there was a person from South Africa but he was only with me for a short time. This in no way insinuates that he left for negative reasons and again in no way did this mean Mr. Satiya would need to watch out. This is clearly a person taking all that was said out of context and manipulating words to fit his need to prove some sort of wrongdoing. In fact little did I know, until the operation became solid that he in fact did not have the skills which he said he possessed. I was tasked with getting the department on board with using the same language as the casino to be able to properly communicate with the casino staff and also have all reports coincide with each other for the sake of reporting clear, concise, comprehensive reports to corporate headquarters. During the upstart of operations a number of incidents occurred which pointed out various issues with his casino aptitude and surveillance skill set. I received many complaints from the casino Manager regarding issues which directly involved Mr. Satiya’s phone usage. I spoke with him about the issues and he would always be one who would say he understood or would say yes when in fact he was not totally on board with the solution.
This created needless confusion and reoccurrences with the casino which I later heard about again after I thought they had in fact been resolved. He tried to hide the fact that he was not able to properly read chips when performing an on camera verification of a cage fill and even though he claims to have had no previous complaints from the previous manager on his previous contract Mr. Satiya had very little to no actual knowledge of time management as he would constantly leave work for the following shift officer to complete or stay behind to do it putting himself in the way of the relieving officer. This of course created more confusion and complaints from the others in the department.
Mr. Satiya makes a negative comment in regards to having been summoned by a hand motion which in America is commonplace. This again is the misunderstanding of cultures. I might add that he never vocalized his distain while this happened and I might add if he had there would be no need to mention it here in his letter of complaint. Even though I was sensitive to cultural differences I in no way claim to be an expert on cultural differences.
Again this website could not know these issues and should refrain from posting letters such as his unless a proper investigation had been conducted by them.
The medical issue, by his accusation, was caused by me not allowing him to go to the bathroom or eat properly; how totally ridiculous. The space in which we all worked had two bathrooms which were literally on the other side of the wall of the office and a mess hall on the same deck 20 steps away in one direction and 150 steps in the other. A mess hall was even open directly across from the main door of the office for some time. I even allowed operators to bring and eat food in the office. No person in his right mind would allow any other person to prevent them from physically relieving themselves if needed or eating for that matter. There at no time was ever any conversation which instructed him or any other operator to not leave the office for personal relief or not to order food to be brought into the office. Keep in mind that this was a cruise ship and food was available around the clock. I as the manager set up availability for those in my department to be able to get food from any open venue no matter what the time day or night as my department worked on a 24 hour schedule. In no way was Mr. Satiya’s medical condition caused or aggravated my me in any way; the truth be told he actually mislead those who had him fill out and sign documents reporting any pre-existing conditions as his medical condition was not documented at the time of induction. The fact that it seemed to become aggravated may be the fact that his attempt to cover up his shortcomings were being uncovered repeatedly by complaints pointing to and exposing his mistakes.
Again this information is not public notice so the website would not know this and should refrain from posting such letters without having proper information about a complaint.
We could go on and on pointing out differences stated by this disgruntled employees opinion and my opinion from a professional side. The end result would be that there is no tangible evidence that any of what Mr. Satiya said in his letter was true except from his convenient selective recollection. I later received information that Mr. Satiya requested to be reinstated and was informed that due to the results of the information found at the conclusion of the investigation into his claim no evidence proving that he was treated in such a manner could be found or proven.
The bottom line is this website should be extra careful when posting claims by those who would go to any length to cause character assignation towards someone they disagree with especially when the majority of wrongdoing lands back in the accusers lap. Overall this particular person cannot be reasoned with since he is not even in the country. I fully understand the loss he may feel due to his having been dismissed because of his medical condition but one must understand that when working on a ship all crew must exhibit a sense of fitness no matter what the individuals personal home situation is. Each crew member relies on another crew member and the passenger relies on us. If anyone has a condition which places them into a high risk category he or she is a danger to the entire crew as well as the passengers. Additionally lying or manipulating the truth especially by an officer of surveillance shows that anything said by that officer cannot fully be believed.
Those reading his letter need to think first before trusting all that is said within.

Gerald Sullivan