My advice to the Prime Minister - We just cannot go on this way is...

Why I advise the Prime Minister week after week

I was extremely surprised that, at a PNM public meeting at Five Rivers Secondary two Saturdays ago, the Honorable Prime Minister would confess that the Sunshine Today is affecting his health to the point where he is forced to take blood pressure tablets. But I was even more surprised over the fact that it had to do with the perceived newspaper criticism of his Government.

PM Dr KEITH ROWLEY at Five Rivers Secondary School on Saturday 6th April, 2019 where he confessed that the Sunshine Today is affecting his health and he is forced to take blood pressure tablets

One would have thought that Dr Rowley would have accepted the advice given to him pro bono by this newspaper, week after week and that he would have moved towards the provision of good governance for the people of Trinidad and Tobago. However instead he sees our advice as an attack on his Cabinet and his Government and, sadly, he treated it as an irritation and an annoyance.

Sunshine Today is not the tool of any political party

To set the records straight Sunshine Today was never designed to be the tool of any political party but rather an instrument through which the oppressed could articulate their oppression and the wrongs committed against our people by the State and others could be exposed. Sunshine Today was birthed to be nothing more than the voice of and for the people.

Unfortunately, Dr Rowley misunderstood the role of this medium, thinking that it would have been a tool of the PNM because of its editorial content during the last election campaign when it targeted the People’s Partnership while they were in government. But what Prime Minister Dr Rowley has failed to understand is that today he is in government, not Kamla. Moreover, Sunshine Today is loyal to no one but the people of our rainbow country.

When he and the present members of his Cabinet and Government who were in Opposition leaked scoops and provided content for Sunshine Today to publish against the then PP government, he never viewed the Sunshine Today as a threat to his health but instead as an opportunity to bolster his chances to be voted into power. In fact, weeks before the General Election of 2015, based on our criticisms of the PP government he publicly boasted, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” For this reason, he may have felt that he would have gotten a free pass; but wrongs against our people by the present government would never be condoned or concealed because the Sunshine Today cannot be bought. Unlike other newspapers, we do not need government ads to survive and therefore we do not compromise our values. Never in the history of this country has Tobago ever suffered so much.

So, what is Rowley’s annoyance all about?

Why is it that our Prime Minister is angry because the Sunshine Today perceives his Government as the worst ever in the post-colonial history, especially when that is the popular view of our citizens? This clearly shows the disconnect between a Government and its people because all that Dr Keith Christopher Rowley has to do is to visit the home of his birth and he would realize that the opinions of Tobagonians are no different than the editorial content of Sunshine Today.

Never in the history of our twin island has Republic had Tobago suffered as much as it is suffering today. Never in our history has unemployment been so high on the sister isle as it is now. And never before in our nation’s history has the Tobago business community rebelled as openly as under the administration of Keith Christopher Rowley.

Go to Tobago, Mr. Prime Minister, and ask the people to go back in their minds to the period of the 1960s when the MV Scarlet Ibis and the MV Bird of Paradise were the boats on the sea bridge and when TTAS used to fly our skies, and ask them whether our air and sea bridge then were not better than under your Government now. If you were brave to ask them, Mr Prime Minister, the response you will receive would be a resounding “yes” because they view their air and sea transport under your Government and your administration as the worst in the history of our country. And you are a born and bred Tobagonian! Yet this newspaper must not advise you on this Tobago sea bridge disaster because you and your government are infallible? You have even sought to buy expeditiously two of the Austal vessels (the wrong vessels by the way) for Tobago so that they can arrive here just in time for the General Election next year; and even two for the Coast Guard as well even though the Damen vessels which were bought for the Coast Guard in 2012 under my watch are parked up in the port for lack of fuel! And we must not speak out!

After three years Sunshine Today and the people were correct re Minister Dillon

In 2016, my editorial addressed the issue of crime and advised you to move the then Minister of National Security and spare your Government the blushes which would have come as a result of spiraling, run-away crime. People were dropping like flies then, the value of human life in Trinidad and Tobago had hit an all-time low, the fear factor among our citizens skyrocketed and it was not only Jack Warner who was calling for the head of the then Minister of National Security. The country was pleading with you to get rid of your Minister.

It took you three years to realize that Sunshine Today and the people were correct when we called Major General Edmund Dillon (Retired) the worst Minister of National Security ever and in embarrassment, you finally conceded and agreed with Sunshine Today and removed him. It was not that this newspaper had anything against your Minister of National Security then or now. It was just that he was a misfit for that office. Now you have the gumption to stand at a political meeting and criticize a newspaper because this newspaper took less than a year to recognize that your Minister lacked the intelligence to keep our country safe while it took you more than three years to arrive at the same conclusion!

The PM selected the worst team ever to govern our country

If you were honest Mr Prime Minister, you yourself would confess that you erred in your judgment and selected the worst team ever to govern our country in the history of Trinidad and Tobago. Do a performance audit of your Cabinet Ministers and if you are brave, tell the country the results. Too many of them demonstrate a lack of fitness to hold office. In your attack on me, you referred to my being on bail and facing extradition to the United States. One would have thought that the office you hold would have demanded judicial prudence on your part since the matter is presently before our courts. But alas! Prime Minister, I will be the first to confess that I have a matter before the courts but it is undecided.

PETER O’CONNOR

I would also be the first to admit that a Government that dismantled an international organisation simply because that government was not given the opportunity by the FIFA to host a World Cup has made allegations against me. But the allegations against me are just allegations and for that, I must not speak out against the wrongs of your Government? This same US government has marginalized you today because of your independent stand on Maduro. You are right, Mr Prime Minister, I am presently on bail but bail is part of our judicial system and it does not discriminate. Your present handpicked Chairman (a former student of mine) was also on bail at one time and today he is your Minister of Energy and Energy Industries! Therefore, bail is no respecter of persons. I also do recall when the Integrity Commission ruled on allegations against you, you never kept silent and today you are Prime Minister of this country. How then am I to view your veiled threat against me since you sit in so high an office where the Judiciary could be easily influenced? Is it that you are threatening me to be silent or else? Is it that you are showing your hand and acting as judge, jury and executioner in a matter that is before the courts?

The worst government ever!

Do you understand sir why you and your Government are being viewed as the worst Government ever? Ask the Petrotrin workers and their families what they think about the Rowley administration and his Government and please tell me whether their views are different from the views expressed by Sunshine Today! Ask the people of this country what they thought about your socalled deal with Sandals, the money you wasted yet failed to get a signature on paper and ask them whether your administration is not the worst ever. And if the people of this country disagree with me then maybe, I would cease to publish. Ask the people whether they agree with your Government giving away our patrimony to Wilfred Espinet and listen to their response. You are going down a dangerous road Mr Prime Minister and your legacy will be remembered infamously by our posterity for generations to come. I feel a sense of pity for you, for under your rule no sector works, the unions are up in arms against you, even our Carnival festival is a failure.

“We just can’t go on this way”

My struggle is to create a sense of stability for our country instead of changing Governments every five years since 1990. I was hoping that you would have listened to the advice from me and others (like the disbanded Economic Advisory Council that was headed by Dr Terrence Farrell) and give to yourself two terms in office to at least achieve the goals you would have set for yourself, but alas! Week after week, several columnists write about the state of the country under your watch and you seem not to be the least disturbed by their candour. Read Peter O’Connor’s column in last Monday’s Guardian on Page A16. In case you missed it, here is what he says - “Our infrastructure is in a state of collapse. Roads, bridges and water mains are all failing everywhere. We continue to fail to deliver the essential commodity - water - to our citizens. We allow “developers” and “farmers” to bulldoze hundreds of acres of forests and farmland for their own use and profit. And all of this failure, this inability to govern, rests not with the pathetic cabinet ministers (certainly not “representatives!”) we elect, but with ourselves. We have not only allowed but encouraged all of this because of our own pathetic indifference.” ‘Peter O’Connor was talking about your Trinidad & Tobago. Nuff said! You, Mr Prime Minister, have advised the people to be careful to whom they listen. I, Mr Prime Minister, am concerned about for whom they vote because if your attitude does not change and you are given a second chance we will be voting into power in 2020 the worst Government that ever ruled the nation-state of Trinidad and Tobago. My advice to you, Mr Prime Minister, in the words of the Explainer, is to take stock because “we just can’t go on this way.”