THE EAST WIND

                    "Should a wise man answer with empty knowledge,
                      and fill himself with the east wind?
                      Should he run with unprofitable talk, or by speeches
                      with which he can do no good?"
                                                                     Book of Job - 15:2&3



I had sincerely hoped that we would be able to put this e mail scandal down by now (I refuse to be a copycat and call it "emailgate"? Can't we be more original than that?) and that the police investigation would be well on its way. Frankly, I don't see how this could take a long time. Experts are available and all of the major players have said that they will co-operate, so there is absolutely no reason why a matter as important as this one is cannot be dealt with swiftly ... and by 'swiftly' I mean first world 'swiftly' ... a week or two at the most. If the investigation is not done quickly then the acting Commissioner of Police will have to say what is the hold up and why it is taking so long. Experts do exist!!

But in the meantime, the whole thing gets murkier. I had said in an earlier post that I didn't believe that Dr. Rowley had sent the alleged e mails to teh President. I had said this because I couldn't believe that the then President had done nothing except forward it to the Integrity Commission, who also did nothing! And yet, at the end of last week former President Richards said 'oh yes! I got that package from Dr. Rowley and held onto it for about five or six days and then sent it on to the Integrity Commission before wiping my hands of the whole thing'.

Okay. The former President didn't exactly say that ... but that is the effect of what he said. So I now have to ask the ex-President why did he not call in the police? You see, included in the contents of the alleged e mails is a conspiracy to kill or seriously injure a citizen of Trinidad & Tobago. What, in the name of heaven, did the former President think taht the Integrity Commission was going to do about that? I can't believe that he was waiting to see if it would actually happen and then join in by saying 'gotcha!' What?

The only valid excuse that I can think of is that His Excellency having perused the documents came to the conclusion that they were so patently false that it was absolutely clear that there was absolutely no threat to the journalist whatsoever. There is no other valid excuse. The same thing goes for the Integrity Commission. I can't believe ...refuse to believe ... that the life of a human being could be so cavalierly treated by someone in that august Commission as being quoted as saying words to the effect that the Commission has a lot of work to do and that is why it hasn't got around to this matter as yet! Really? You have more important work to do than saving someone's life!?

I am not even going to bother commenting on Dr.Rowley's actions. Clearly, at best, if he really believed those alleged e mails to be true, he was playing politics with somebody's life! And that, in my view, is unforgivable. He should have gone to the police right away!

A TANGLED WEB

A famous quotation from Sir Walter Scott (1771 -1832) reads:

               "O what a tangled web we weave,
                When first we practise to deceive!"

This quote came to my mind this morning as the continuing saga of Dr. Rowley's e mails unfolds. Let me say here and now and quite candidly that I now believe beyond reasonable doubt that the e mails are fakes. Whether Dr. Rowley knew that the e mails were forgeries is another question. Most certainly, from what we are now hearing and seeing on our television screens, that at the very least he is guilty of gross recklessness in doing what he did in the way that he did it. A more thoughtful person would have checked those alleged e mails much more carefully before publicising them in the manner that the erstwhile Leader of the Opposition adopted.

Since Monday's revelations in Parliament a number of PNM spokesmen have come out batting for Dr. Rowley. Leading the attack for his leader is the PNM's Public Relations Officer, Mr. Faris Al-Rawi, who also happens to be a PNM Senator. On television yesterday morning Mr. Al-Rawi waxed warm in defending and supporting his leader. When asked the obvious question as to why the PNM did nothing about these e mails which they had supposedly had since December, Mr. Al-Rawi said words to the effect that they sent them to the highest office holder in the land ... the President.  And then he went on to say that President Richards had sent them to the Integrity Commission! Why send them to the Police? They were sent to the very top!! You can't get higher than the President!

Well, all I can say is hold it sherriff! She's headin' for the strawberry patch! Really? You sent those e mails to the President? And by "you" I mean the PNM. So that means that not only Dr. Rowley knew about those e mails but others in the PNM knew about them too? And therefore President Richards knew about them in December? And the Integrity Commission knew about it also in December?!

You see, in those e mails are (amongst other things) some very, very serious threats on the life of a journalist ... a citizen of this country. So, leaving aside any "politricks" that the e mails are alleging you are also talking about major criminality here. Therefore, if Dr. Rowley and Mr. Al-Rawi are indeed telling the truth this must mean that our former President George Maxwell Richards knew that there was a threat to the life of a citizen and he did nothing about it! Further, the Integrity Commission also knew and it also did nothing about it! Further, others in the PNM also knew or believed that it was possible that a young woman might be killed! And nobody did anything to prevent that from happening!!

You see what I mean? This scandal is too serious to just let it go like that. Mr. Ken Gordon, the Chairman of the Integrity Commission,  is quoted in the press this morning as saying that if the e mails are true then that would be very serious. But I must ask Mr. Gordon directly, what if the e mails are forgeries? Fakes? Wouldn't that also be very serious? Have you also considered that possibility?  And also, did the President send them to you in December or at any other time before he left office? If so. what did you (Mr. Gordon/Integrity Commission) do about them? Did you alert the police? If so, when? Because Mr. Gordon's public pronouncement today suggests that he, like the rest of us, only heard about this when Dr. Rowley went to Parliament.

And if the Integrity Commission and the President knew about this way back in December, or whenever, and did nothing about it, the question arises as to why they did nothing? Did they believe that the threats were not real? That the e mails were fakes? Or were they waiting for an "Ah! Ha!' moment when the journalist got killed so that they could say to the Prime Minister and the Attorney General "gotcha!" In other words, were they too playing politics with the life of a citizen? Because the only reason that I can think as to why the Opposition was keeping quiet for so long was because they wanted the murder to take place and then they coud say "gotcha!". Can anybody give me another credible reason? This, of course, assumes that the e mails were real. If at all times those in the know knew that they were forgeries then obviously nobody was really worried. The threat was faked! So nobody had to alert the police.

Let me say that I do believe that neither Mr. Richards nor any member of the Integrity Commission (including Mr. Gordon)  ever saw these alleged e mails before Dr. Rowley dropped them in Parliament.  But if they did, as the PNM is alleging, then a lot more people other than Dr. Rowley have some real questions to answer. We'll have to wait and see, but Sir Walter Scott's words of warning remain as true today as they were some two hundred years ago when he first wrote them.

ROWLEY'S HAIL MARY PASS

In American football there is a play that is referred to as a "Hail Mary pass". What happens is this: a touchdown is worth six points. It sometimes happens that one team is behind by, say, four points, and there is only enough time on the clock for the team that is behind to make one more play. If the team scores a touchdown on that play it wins the game. If it does not score ... well, that's it! They lose! Usually the quarterback of the team that is behind at  this time throws the football to a receiver that is way downfield. If the receiver catches the ball a touchdown is certain. That is why it's called a 'Hail Mary' as when the ball is going through the air for those few interminable seconds you can almost hear the supporters of that team as well as the quarterback saying "Hail Mary, full of grace ...".

Dr. Keith Rowley's play in Parliament yesterday could be labelled such a pass because if what he said turns out to be not true he will have effectively sunk himself and his PNM team. That would be it! Finito! Kaput! On the other hand, if all that he has said is true the Government is sunk!

Dr. Rowley showed clearly yesterday that he understood clearly that he simply had to come with something new for the no confidence motion that he was bringing. A simple re-hashing of past issues was not going to cut it. So he came up with some e mails that, if true, are so serious that they would bring the Government down, as I said earlier. The e mails basically allege a criminal conspiracy between the Prime Minister, the Attorney General and the Prime Minister's special security adviser, Captain Gary Griffith over the section 34 issue. Further the e mails go further to suggest that the parties involved were planning serious harm to a journalist.

The problem here is that the e mails appear on their very face to be faked. For example, a lot of the e mails are supposed to have come from an e mail address: anan@ gmail.com. But it is not possible to create a g mail account with less than six characters. So, that e mail address would have to be, say, anan12@gmail.com in order to be valid. (And as if to prove this my computer has highlighted and underlined the fake address that I just made up the way that it does whenever I type a real e mail or web address. It didn't do that for the "anan" address.) So, what are we to make of this? Then there is another e mail address that ends in ".coN "(I have high lighted and capitalised the "n" for emphasis). There should be an "m" where the "n"is. Then there is an alleged exchange of e mails between Captain Griffith and Mr. Ramlogan starting with Mr. Ramlogan allegedly e mailing Captain Griffith at 1:33am on a Monday morning and Captain Griffith replying at 1:40am! So? So these men don't sleep and are sitting on their computers at that time?! Really? I'm sorry. That doesn't make sense.

There are other things that lead me to believe that the e mails are faked, but hopefully you get the point. Then Dr. Rowley wants us to believe that he had this information for the last six months!? Really? So he is saying that he knew that there was a threat on the life of the journalist but did nothing about it?! What was he waiting for? For the woman to be killed and then he could say 'ah!Ha! Caught you!' In other words, scoring political points is more important than saving someone's life!?

(There are other things too. Did anyone notice, for example, that the Express published all the e mails with the adresses, except the ".con" address was deleted in their publication? I wonder why they did that? Hmmmm! Makes you think, doesn't it?)

But back to the erstwhile Leader of the Opposition. The accusations that he has made are very, very serious. The Prime Minister has quite properly referred them to the Commissioner of Police. If they turn out to be true the Prime Minister and her Attorney General will have to resign. There is no question of that! But if the accusations turn out to be false then Dr. Rowley should be expelled from the Parliament. This is much too serious to warrant a slight slap on the wrist or a mere suspension. No one should be allowed to make accusations like this in the Parliament ... the highest court in our land ... if they are not true. No one!

Competent Leadership or Rabble Rousing?

While it has been some 8 years since I was last privileged to be a member of the Parliament of Trinidad & Tobago and as a result my memory of the Standing Orders is now somewhat hazy, I seemed to remember something in them saying in effect that a member cannot "re-discuss" something that was raised in another debate. In other words, a member cannot regurgitate something that was already discussed in another debate.

Well, my memory is admittedly hazy, so I checked the Standing Orders of the House of Representatives and found that I was partially right. Standing Order 36(3) says in effect (my words) that a member cannot raise a matter which has already been dealt with in a current session. A session of Parliament is historically a period lasting usually less than one year when Parliament meets. At the end of the session Parliament is prorogued, but no general election is called, and the legislators have a chance to return to their constituencies until the next session is called.

But all this aside, the reason that my curiosity was piqued was because the Leader of the Opposition has filed yet another motion of no confidence in the Prime Minister (no confidence motions against the Government of the day are always filed against the Prime Minister of the day) and I wondered what was new from the last time he filed such a motion. Then I heard the public relations officer of the PNM, Senator Faris Al-Rawi, giving a list on television of all of the things that the PNM was going to raise in the instant motion. Of all the things that he raised on TV the only thing that was new (i.e., that was not included in the last debate)  was what can be called "the section 34 issue". Now I have already previously dealt with this particular matter when it was a "hot" topic and I don't propose to deal with it again. But, if the Opposition wants to have a debate on section 34 then it is perfectly entitled to do so.

However, I find it difficult to understand the logic in regurgitating matters that even if they were debated in the last session of Parliament and therefore technically falling outside the rules, so that we get the same thing all over again just in slightly different words. Is the Opposition really serious in suggesting that this is an efficient use of Parliamentary time? After all, isn't what was said in the last debate simply going to be repeated all over again? If so, what exactly is the point about this debate? Everything is already on the Parliamentary record. The Opposition on the last occasion put all of their members in to speak. Only Mr. Manning was silent. Is the same thing going to happen again?

Let me be clear: if the erstwhile Senator Al-Rawi mis-spoke on television or I misunderstood him and there are indeed new matters to place on record then I withdraw my criticisms completely. I would be the first to say that the Opposition has every right ... indeed, a responsibility ... to bring a motion of no confidence. But if nothing new is going to come out of the debate then I would have to say that the debate is going to be a tremendous waste of Parliamentary time and is not a proper use of Parliamentary resources.It also speaks volumes about the lack of real and competent leadership in what ought to be the alternative government of Trinidad & Tobago. And that is serious! There are many serious issues to be dealt with in this country and we simply don't need an Opposition that believes that the best way to represent the people is by trying to score political points ... and that is what the real purpose of this debate, quite frankly, looks like!

And if you say to me 'what about section 34'? My reply would be 'okay, that's new. Go ahead and debate it if you want'. But then it will be a very short debate for the answers to those charges have been on record for a long time and (conveniently) ignored by those opposed to the Government. 

I must confess that I really don't expect much from the upcoming debate except for a lot of predictable rabble rousing. Would that I be proved wrong and we could see some competent alternative leadership! The best government always comes when there is a credible alternative!

Incidentally, if you ask me what do I think are the big issues that the Opposition ought to be paying attention to, let me spell them out for you:
                          J-O-B-S
                          C-R-I-M-E
                          H-E-A-L-T-H
                          E-D-U-C-A-T-I-O-N
I would love to hear exactly what the PNM would do to solve these big issues. I don't need to hear any more criticisms. I need to hear solutions.

SUMMARY JUSTICE vs. SOME JUSTICE

As the Sir Anthony Coleman Commission of Enquiry (COE) into the affairs of CLICO and the Hindu Credit Union winds its weary way down after spending millions and millions of taxpayers dollars we are all left with the obvious question: so, what happens next? Because I doubt whether there is anybody who is going to be surprised that the Coleman report will be absolutely scathing in its criticisms of Lawrence Duprey, Harry Harnarine and the other members of the repective cast members in both organisations. Indeed, it would be mind boggling if the report was not severely critical of all of the actors on those two particular stages.

But the truth is that most people don't believe that anything will come of Sir Anthony's report. It is absolutely astounding that after all the time that has elapsed since the collapse of both institutions that not one criminal charge has been levied against anybody in either CLICO or the Hindu Credit Union. The Director of Public Prosecutions can hardly claim that he was waiting on Sir Anthony's report. He is on record as trying to limit the Enquiry because of his own investigations. So? What exactly is taking him so long to bring charges? What? And the mainstream media has been muted in its criticisms of the apparent footdragging by the DPP. Why? How many years does the DPP need to investigate these two matters? Two? Three? Five? Twenty? Because he has now had at least four years and not a single charge has been levied against anybody!! Incredible!!

That we aspire to live under a system of laws is a fact. That we deplore summary or what some call "Wild West" justice is also a good thing. It is axiomatic that persons accused of anything must be given every opportunity to defend themselves. No one can quarrel with that even when, for example, wealthy accused are able to drag out the cases over long periods of time (Ish and Steve come to mind). A man has an absolute right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty.

But for crying out loud, there has to be some justice available to the society. What has happened to the CLICO policy holders/investors and the HCU depositers is really, really, really wrong. I personally believe that crimes have been committed. Irregular salary and pension packages, golden handshakes and bonuses in the millions when the institutions were clearly bankrupt, over generous fees for attending meetings to rubber stamp decisions and dodgy auditors' reports all need to be dealt with and should have been scrutinised years ago. But they haven't been, at least not by those (e.g., the DPP) who could really do something about it.

There are reportedly some five million pages of evidence from the Coleman COE. Surely the DPP should have and could have been reading that evidence as it was unfolding!? What exactly is he (the DPP) investigating now? And who is he investigating? I am sure that most of us could give him a list!

It is high time that charges were brought ... and serious charges. Persons who were robbed in both debacles have died after being effectively bankrupted by the failures of these two institutions. No. Some justice is necessary now. And the tragedy is that although criticisms can always be levied against politicians in both the main political parties the truth is that it seems to be the fault of our non-political institutions that the debacles were allowed to happen in the first place and that nobody has been called to account in the second. And to be absolutely clear, I am criticising here the Central Bank, the Commissioner of Co-Operatives and the Director of Public Prosecutions.

DON'T CRY FOR ME VENEZUELA!

In the midst of all of the political happenings in T&T we have not been paying any real attention to what is going on just a few kilometers/miles to the west of us. Our comparitively huge neighbour is in real trouble and only the most sycophantic Chavistas will not admit it. Real standards of living are in free fall and one of the world's potentially richest countries is in for the devil of a time. The immediate future facing Venezuelans is one of blood, sweat and tears.

Let me explain: when the 7th October 2012 presidential elections the total number of electors on the electoral list was 18, 854,935.  On 14th April, 2013 the total number of electors registered to vote was 18,904,364. So? What's the big deal? There is an increase in the list of registered voters by 49,429 new electors. I agree that there should be nothing wrong with this except that the authorities refused to allow any new registrations beyween the two elections. I know this because I know several people in Caracas whose children turned 18 after 7th October, 2012 and who were prevented from registering to vote! Nobody, they were told could register to vote for the new Presidential election. It was to be fought on the old electoral list!

Then, on the night of the 14th April presidential elections, the television stations started broadcasting that Maduro was the winner with 50.66 per cent of the popular vote as against 49.07 per cent for his opponent Enrique Capriles. The only problem with this broadcast was that they posted on television the actual amount of votes that each candidate had received: 7,505,388 votes for Maduro as against 7,720,403 votes for Capriles!! Got that? According to the TV stations Maduro had won with 215,065 votes less than Capriles had received. (And by the way, I personally saw the several broadcasts on this before they took the figures down, so I am reporting absolute facts!!) They later reported that Maduro got 7.27 million votes ... but it took a looonnngggg time to fix! What happened? I have seen no explanations for this.

There are unconfirmed reports of ballots being destroyed and about the army burning ballot papers. I have seen videos of this but cannot say definitively that they are accurate or entirely truthful. However, in light of the fact that Maduro refused a recount and has had himself sworn in and then has allowed a recount which is going to take more than a month I must confess that my suspicions have been aroused as to both the validity of the published results as well as what the result of the recount will be. In fact, I'll take a bet (one dollar to one doughnut ... and we'll decide later who pays the dollar and who pays the doughnut) that the recount results will "show" that Maduro has won.

Incidentally, the opposition in Venezuela says that Capriles actually got 53.5 per cent of the popular vote as against Maduro getting 44.3 per cent. Interesting, eh?

In the meantime, Venezuela, a country full of oil, gold, timber and other minerals is in serious financial trouble. The official exchange rate of the bolivar to the US dollar is about 6bs to US$1. The blackmarket rate is now about 24bs to US$1!!! There are shortages of the most basic commodities: milk, butter, flour, bread, and even women's sanitary napkins! Inflation is approaching 30% for this year which is not even half over. There already has been a 33% devaluation of the currency in February and another one is expected soon. Maduro's answer is that (a) it's not really happening and (b) if it is all the troubles are (you guessed it!) the fault of and caused by the United States! But Venezuela continues to supply Cuba with oil to the value of about US$2 billion per month and not get paid for it! Not bad for a country going broke! But then it's the Yankees fault!

There is talk of newer laws to come which will further encroach on the freedoms of the country's citizenry, which, if true, will simply add more layers onto a population already groaning under a tyrant's yoke. The latest move to say to elected representatives that they cannot speak in the country's Parliament unless they recognise Maduro as the duly elected President is yet another example of the real and galloping dictatorship. Well, Mr. Maduro, for what it's worth, I recognise you as being the duly elected President of Venezuela ... duly elected by a fraudulent process and a fraudulent result, but "duly elected" nonetheless!! Just be careful, Mr. Maduro, because I predict that sooner or later the  same guns that you have turned against your people will turn against you. Violence always breeds violence!
 What a tragedy!!

A MODERN DAY ROBIN HOOD?

About seven or eight hundred years ago there was a character called Robin of Locksley who some how has morphed into a legend known as Robin Hood. According to the legend, Robin Hood stole from the rich and gave to the poor. He is supposed to have stood up to the injustices that existed under the rule of the Norman or Norman leaning Prince John, whose brother King Richard had been captured somewhere in France on his way back from the crusades and was being held for a ransom which his brother (Prince John) was reluctant to pay. As a result, the English peasantry as well as the English nobility was groaning under the tyranny of Prince John and his Norman cohorts.

Whether the legend is true or not it has certainly captured the imagination of the public down through the centuries. Just about everybody knows the story of Robin Hood and he is garlanded with accolades and regarded as a genuine hero who stood up against tyranny and fought for the little man.

But what if we could somehow go back in a time machine to the time of Robin Hood and sort out and separate for ourselves fact from fiction? I am almost certain that we would find that Robin Hood was not quite the character that history and legend has made him out to be. It is highly likely that we would find that the "establishment" of the period would regard Mr. Hood as an out and out criminal who deserved to be hanged at dawn ... if they could only catch him. And if there were newspapers around then (and there weren't) the press would almost universally be condemning Robin. You could almost imagine a typical headline: 'HOOD STRIKES AGAIN! BOLD CRIMINAL AND GANG ROBS SHERRIFF OF NOTTINGHAM'S NIECE IN DARING HOLD-UP. NOBLES RENEW CALL FOR LAW AND ORDER AND OFFER A REWARD FOR CAPTURE OF CRIMINAL AND HIS GANG".

I am also certain that Mr. Hood would not have given away everything that he stole but would have kept a (very) large proportion of the proceeds of his activities for his own personal benefit. The altruism that the legend attributes to him is normally found only amongst the saints and holy people who from time to time have walked amongst us.

In other words, assuming (but certainly not accepting) that every thing that his critics and detractors say about Jack Warner is true, then except for the names and a few other changes his story and that of Robin Hood is a very similar one. And one can understand why he (Mr. Warner) is so popular ... for the same reasons that Robin Hood was popular almost a millenia ago.

But there are some critical differences. And the biggest difference is that in our modern society it is becoming more and more difficult to get away with criminal activity if (and only if) the State wants to get you. Mr. Warner made a brilliant political move last week when he resigned his seat and announced that he would seek re-election. He put everybody on their backfeet. The Prime Minister was faced with a very real problem: if she allowed him to run as a UNC candidate and he won (which he would) then she would have a potential rival for leadership of the Party ... something that no leader can tolerate. If she sought to block him by preventing him from getting through the screening process and he ran and won as an independent then her leadership would probably be fatally wounded. Talk about 'ouch'!

The PNM also would be badly hurt. Mr. Warner could taunt them with their "voice of the people is the voice of God" mantra whenever they hurled any insults or accusations against him. Mr. Warner would easily have become the most powerful politician in Trinidad & Tobago.

But late last week, somebody in the police force threw something into the mix that could de-rail the ex-National Security Minister severely. Somebody in the police caused a file to be sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions relating to the possible breach of the Customs Act in what might loosely be called the Bim Hammam affair with the paper bags of US$40,000 in cash. Now, if the DPP decides to charge Mr. Warner with this matter it could effectively de-rail Mr. Warner's hopes of running for re-election as the UNC's candidate for Chaguanas West as the UNC's rules prevent it from endorsing any person as a candidate who is on an indictable charge before the courts of this land. Kamla gets off the hook as she would be prevented from allowing Warner's candidacy to go forward.

Mr. Warner would then be deprived of accusing the Prime Minister (or anybody else) from conspiring to de-rail him and keep him out. In those circumstances the UNC faithful would find it difficult to support him. In other words, he could actually lose the by-election. That would cause a big headache to go away for both the UNC as well as the PNM.

Ahhh! Life in the tropics! Never a dull moment! We shall have to wait and see what happens next, but you can be certain that this story has more twists and turns than a novella. The only thing that we can be certain about is that it ain't over yet! Not by a long shot!

RE-WRITING HISTORY or SAUCE FOR THE GOOSE

So Jack Warner has gone. Frankly, I don't really see that he had a choice. While I agree that the newspaper articles were serious, I also agreed with the Prime Minister's 'wait and see' attitude. You don't fire somebody because of newspaper allegations ... especially when the allegations are coming from a biased source. But the ball game changes when the allegations come from an investigating committee such as that headed by Sir David Simmons for FIFA and CONCACAF.

Mr. Warner will have to deal with these allegations now. It is not good enough to say that he will deal with them at some future date. It is absolutely necessary that he clears his name as soon as possible. If he doesn't then he will find himself politically as dead as the dodo bird, and probably in some serious legal trouble, if he is not already.

Of course, he could take a leaf out of Dr. Keith Rowley's notebook on how to deal with seemingly damning and irrefutable allegations. You will recall that Dr. Rowley, while a Minister in the Manning Regime, was associated with a land development project in Tobago known as Landate. The project was in his wife's name but everybody believed that he was the driving force behind it. In any case, the project was going on at the same time that the Scarborough General Hospital was being constructed by a very, very large local construction company called NH International which is owned by Dr. Rowley's good friend, Emile Elias. And here is where the story gets murky.

The company doing the Landate project was a very, very small Tobago based company owned by a chap called Warner (not Jack). This company subcontracted the major portion (something like 99 percent) of the Landate project to NH International. Then NH International started to remove materials and equipment from the Scarborough General Hospital site without either the knowledge or theconsent of the engineer in charge of that project and carry them up to the Landate site.

A commission of enquiry recommended that NH International be investigated by the police with a view to determining whether or not there had been any breaches of the Larceny Act. (In other words and in local parlance, to see if anybody t'ief!) But the police mysteriously could not find the relevant files and the matter has never been investigated. Further, then Prime Minister Patrick Manning never looked into the mysterious disappearance of those files either. (Incidentally, all the police had to do was read the report of the commission of enquiry andlook at the transcripts of the evidence ... and, for the record, I know that they were told where to look because I personally told them! I was involved in the commission of enquiry.)

In any case, the next thing that happened was the the Integrity Commission referred Dr. Rowley to the Director of Public Prosecutions for his involvement in that whole rather sordid affair. Dr. Rowley went to the High Court seeking a stay of the referral on the ground that the Inegrity Commission should have called him in and asked for his side of the story before referring the matter to the DPP. A High Court Judge agreed with Dr. Rowley, the members of the Integrity Commission resigned and the whole matter has come to an abrupt halt. The question of whether or not there has been criminal conduct in this affair either by Dr. Rowley or by NH International or anybody else has never been determined!

I raise this now because what is sauce for the goose ought to be sauce for the gander. I heard Senator Al Rawi say on television yesterday that a Judge of the High Court had found Dr. Rowley completely innocent in the Landate affair. That is simply not true. The sad truth is that no investigation was ever done in that matter, either by the police nor by the "ever vigilant and fearless" press. 'Why not' is, of course, the big question. Perhaps the old Jack Warner could ask Keith Rowley how he (Rowley) managed to get that issue to die? Because nowhere have I seen a report that the Simmons Committee interviewed Mr. Warner before issuing their damning and damaging report. If that is so, then can Jack Warner also go to Court and cite Rowley's case as an authority for stopping everything in it's tracks?

ARE YOU STILL BEATING YOUR WIFE?

When I first qualified as a lawyer I was taught a great trick in cross examination: put a question to a witness in such a way that no matter how he answered he would effectively admit whatever it was that you were trying to get out of him. A classic example of this type of questioning is: 'are you still beating your wife?' If the witness answers "yes" then, of course, you have him. But if he answers "no" then there is a clear inference that he used to beat her, just that he doesn't do so any more. In other words you will catch him no matter what he answers!

Veteran Express reporter Camini Marajh sent a list containing some 40 questions to Mr. Jack Warner, the Minister of National Security, last week Wednesday. Both the tenor as well as the content of all of the questions lead the reader in absolutely no doubt that the reporter is in possession of certain information that is potentially extremely damaging to the erstwhile National Security Minister. But some of the questions are also "are you still beating your wife" questions. Take, for example, question no. 13:

            "Much has been said about your (Warner's) role in facilitating the May 2011 cash-for-vote                 
               affair. Two investigatory hearings, FIFA Ethics Committee and CAS, found "credible   
              evidence" that directly connects you to the cash. In fact, the undisputed evidence places the  
              cash in your government office on the afternoon of May 10.. Can you please tell me about 
              the circumstances leading to the presence of a suitcase full of cash in your old Minister of  
              Works office in London Street in Port of Spain? Comment also on the view that your 
              conduct in this matter was an abuse of the public's trust."

Now, just taking this one question as an example, what impression do you get from it? The impression that I get is : (a) That it is an absolute fact that a suitcase full of cash was found in Mr. Warner's office;
           (b) That this is not only an absolute fact but it is also undisputed, which means (inter alia) that
                 Mr. Warner admits this;
            (c) That there is a public perception that this was an abuse of the public's trust; and
            (d) That the reporter believes that Mr. Warner is a crook of the highest order, just that
                  she isn't saying this so bluntly.

I am not aware, for example, that Mr. Warner has ever admitted that a bundle of cash was found in his office! Indeed, a question immediately arises as to who found it and what did he do about it? And if he did nothing, then why not? Why didn't he do something? Is this "undisputed fact" really a fact? Next, why should Mr. Warner talk to the reporter if she clearly believes that he is a crook? Is there anything that he can do or say to change her mind which appears to be already made up? The same, or similar comments can be made about the other 39 questions. And I am not here going to deal with the Express pretending that Mr. Warner had not replied to Ms. Marajh. That in itself is yet another example of not being entirely honest or straight forward. At best, it's claim that Mr. Warner did not reply was a half truth ... and half truths are often more dangerous than lies.

Mr. Warner's rather elegant reply to the reporter was in essence: I don't trust you to report accurately or honestly on anything that I might say and as a result I ain't talkin' to you or your newspaper. You all are not honest in your reporting and in any case I don't have to tell you diddleysquat!

Well, in this Mr. Warner is absolutely correct. The Express has been less than honest or straight forward in its reporting on the activities (or non-activities) of various Government Ministers (the "big" news about the non ownership of a Rolls Royce motor car comes to mind) and honestly, if Mr. Warner were my client (and he is NOT) I would have advised him not to answer anything that the Express were to ask for precisely that reason, i.e., that their reporting and commentary is biased and that they will obviously use anything he says to them to hang him.

But, (and it is a big "BUT") the public interest is clearly not being served here at all. The accusations and rumors swirling around Mr. Warner's head are very serious and cannot and ought not to be ignored or pushed aside. We, the public, deserve to have answers to the many, many questions that are swirling around. We need to know whether or not there really is a fire or just some very good smoke making machines. And here is where a free and honest press comes in. It does not help when an accusation is made by someone who is clearly biased. (There are very few divorced men or women, for example,   whose ex wives or ex husbands  will say that they are great guys or girls, as the case may be. But, the truth is that some of them are! Some of them aren't!). The obvious bias that pervades the pages of both the newspapers, especially the Express, against the government makes any person within the government understandably gun shy of talking to reporters. They never know how their words are going to be twisted. The government is not guilty of trying to muzzle the press or to interfere with its freedom. In any case, the press is free to twist things any way it likes within the boundaries of libel, and to report or not report on anything that it likes. But when it acts in a patently biased manner and consistently twists its reporting in a manner that is essentially dishonest (e.g. the Rolls Royce story) then certainly the victims of the biased reporting are not only within their rights not to speak to the offending media, but would be well advised not to do so.

The obvious war that the media (and the Express in particular) has declared on the government ought to be brought to an early end. From my viewpoint, this war is not doing the country any good at all.

Please do not interpret what I have said here as in any way being a defence of either Jack Warner or the government. It is not meant to be. It is simply an effort to bring things back to the centre. Every government ... every political party ...  needs the press to get its message out. Every newspaper needs the politicians in order to get stories to put in its pages in order to sell its papers. The relationship doesn't have to be cordial. In fact, it probably works best when there is  a certain slight hostility or distrust. But there does have to be a certain honesty and respect from both sides. And therein lies the problem: the press clearly doesn't respect the government nor has it been honest in its reporting about the government. As a start, perhaps the press could "set the re-set button" and go back to honest reporting. Either that, or come out honestly and admit that it has in fact declared war on the present administration and intends to do all in its power to bring the government down. But we really can't continue like this. It can only lead to trouble ... and we have enough problems on our plate already!

ROGUE ELEMENTS IN THE MEDIA?

The uproar in the Press to the Prime Minister's allegation earlier this week that there are rogue elements in the media was entirely predictable. The media in Trinidad & Tobago are notorious for never apologising for anything they do whether right or wrong (and especially when they are wrong) and for guarding their turf jealously. This is a pity, because more often than is happy the media say and do things that are just plain wrong, and there is little or no redress other than a very expensive and time consuming law suit for defamation. They know this full well and tend to take advantage of it. For every law suit for defamation there must be at least twenty instances of the media being "naughty" and wrong.

Don't believe me? It happens all the time. Look, just the other day the Express newspaper published an article with a headline to the effect that the Attorney General was denying that a certain Rolls Royce motor car belonged to him. The article was even accompanied by a photograph of the car complete with a Trinidad licence plate! Most of the article (and the headline) was about the AG's denial that the car was his, but towards the end of the article it was reported that the car in fact was registered to a very well known company and quoted the managing director of that company as saying that the car was his and that he had owned several Rolls Royce motor cars previously. But you had to read the whole article to get to the truth. So, why the headline and the article? This surely wasn't news?!

The only reason that I can think of was that the Express wanted to embarrass the Attorney General. I can think of no other reason. What is news worthy about a Government Minister NOT owning an expensive motor car? The answer is: nothing! Nothing at all!! So, if they weren't trying to embarrass the AG why would they print such an article? Nothing else makes sense. If anyone can give me another plausible reason as to why the Express would print such an article I will immediately apologise.

This is the second time that the Express has attacked the Attorney General in this manner. The first time was over some apartments that he bought shortly after taking up office. Again, in that article (as in "the Rolls Royce article") the reader was left with the distinct impression that there was some sort of 'hanky panky' ... or to put it more bluntly, corruption ... taking place but that the paper just can't prove it. Certainly, that was my impression.

But this surely is wrong. A newspaper shouldn't be allowed to print an article like "the Rolls Royce article" without some more facts. If the newspaper suspects that the Attorney General is involved in some sort of corruption then it should say so ... and not slide around the issue in a manner that, frankly, reeks of dishonest and malicious reporting.

Unfortunately, it doesn't stop there. The Guardian has also stepped into the act with some rather serious attacks on the erstwhile and very voluble Sports Minister, Mr. Anil Roberts. Basically what happened was that there seems to have been some rather serious allegations concerning the Boxing Board, the end result of which has caused the Integrity Commission to refer the matter to the Director of Public Prosecutions. The Guardian reported that amongst those being referred to the DPP was the Sports Minister. This turned out to be incorrect.

Now, any referral of any matter to the DPP is serious.And a report like this one is bound to make the ordinary citizen look twice at the Minister. But it wasn't true. What is true (at least from all that is in the public domain) is that there are some rather serious issues to be looked at that could possibly constitute corruption of some sort by certain people. But (at least for the moment) the Minister is definitely NOT one of them! The story is clearly not finished and, I dare say, a lot more will come out. But at the very least, surely the Guardian could have and should have published a front page apology to the Minister ... especially if there was no ulterior motive but just a desire to report the facts. So, why hasn't such an apology been made? It doesn't make sense ... unless, there is something else behind the article. But what?!? Does the Guardian have more facts that implicate the Minister? If so, then they should come out and say so.  Or is there another more sinister and (ultimately) dishonest motive? What? And if there was no malice, why didn't/doesn't the Guardian apologise? It doesn't make sense!

And I am not getting into the counter allegations of the Minister against the reporter, nor of her responses to him. I am about what is right and about doing the right thing and about what are the undisputed facts. I do not accept the media's brushing aside the fact that it wrongly reported that a matter involving Mr. Roberts was referred to the DPP and effectively refusing to apologise for their mistake. It is right that someone should aplogise when he has done something wrong, especially if the mistake was a genuine one. (Of course, it is harder to apologise where the mistake was deliberate and not accidental!) I think that Mr. Roberts was right when he said that the media should be held to as high a standard as possible. I do not accept that freedom of the press means licence to print or broadcast anything that you want. I do not believe that the Prime Minister's statement about rogue elements in the media can even be remotely construed as an attack on press freedom. I do believe that there are rogue elements in the media, and by that I mean elements that have their own agendas, some of them hidden, and which have nothing to do with reporting the facts but everything to do with the furtherance of their particular agenda or agendas. And nothing that I have seen or heard over the last many years has convinced me otherwise.

The best expression of how I believe the modern media should operate comes from a man called C.P. Scott (1846 - 1932) who said:

      "The newspaper is of necessity something of a monopoly,
        and its first duty is to shun the temptations of a monoploy.
        Its primary office is the gathering of news. At the peril of
        its soul it must see that the supply is not tainted. Neither in
        what it gives, nor in what it does not give, nor in the mode
        of presentation, must the unclouded face of truth suffer
        wrong. Comment is free but facts are sacred."

Our media certainly cannot put its hand on its heart and swear that this is exactly what it does. Lightning would strike them down if they did that!
Perhaps now might be an appropriate time for a Commission of Enquiry into the operations of the media in Trinidad & Tobago?

DANGEROUS TIMES FOR VENEZUELA (and by extension the Region)

Acting Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has said something over the week-end that is as dangerous and potentially destabilising as can be imagined. He has claimed that he has evidence of a plot by the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency to kill his right wing rival, Enrique Capriles, and trigger a coup before the April 14th Presidential election. He said that the plan was to kill Mr. Capriles and then blame it on Mr. Maduro and his cronies thus destabilising the country.

Now you have only to look at this to see not only how stupid such an action would be for the United States, but how Maduro is really thinking. It would be a very, very stupid thing for the United States to do because Mr. Capriles is the one candidate who has been able to unite Venezuela's fractious opposition. The death of Mr. Capriles would set back Venezuelan opposition unity by several years ... and THAT would not be in the best interests of the United States! And whatever you might want to say or think about the Americans, one thing you cannot say is that they are stupid! They act (as do ALL countries) in what is in their own best interests ... and there is nothing wrong with that! And it canNOT be in America's best interests to destabilise the opposition in Venezuela.

But for Mr. Maduro to say that there is a plot by the Americans to kill Mr. Capriles quite frankly looks more like a very amateurish way of saying that he (Maduro) is planning to do just that and blame it on the Americans when it happens. I didn't hear Mr. Maduro say, for example, that as his Government has uncovered this dastardly plot that the Government was stepping up security for Mr. Maduro. Why not? Wouldn't this happen in a proper democracy? But Venezuela's government is anything but democratic.

This is not the first time that Mr. Maduro has made outrageous claims. He has said that Mr. Chavez's cancer was in fact caused by the Americans who somehow managed to infect him some two years ago. Of course, the world still has not been told exactly what type of cancer killed Mr. Chavez nor has the world got details of the treatment that the late President underwent. Nor do we know how the Americans could so cleverly infect Chavez and kill him so slowly. Assuming (though not accepting) that the Americans could have infected and did infect Chaez with something, wouldn't it have made more sense to have killed Mr. Chavez quickly rather than have it take two long years? But little details like this are irrelevant when you are dealing with such a liar as Maduro obviously is.

Maduro has clearly learned the lesson of Josef Goebbels (Adolf Hitler's Nazi Minister of Propaganda), that the bigger the lie and the more often it is repeated the more people will believe it.

The problem is that he is clearly signalling that he does not care an iota for the truth and neither does he care what he says about anybody or anything. It is also clear that he is a man who will say or do anything to retain power at all costs. I expect him to be declared the winner in next month's election. I do not expect there to be a free and fair election.  I also expect that Venezuela will continue to spiral downwards after the election and become more and more impoverished. The dangers are obvious for the ordinary Venezuelan citizen. The problem is that instability in one of the Region's largest and most powerful countries can cause ripple effects in the neighbourhood ... and T&T is very close to Venezuela!

Maduro is much more dangerous than most people realise. A leader who has to lie and effectively threaten to kill his political opponents in order to stay in power is a leader who ought to be condemned by all right thinking peoples every where. The Venezuelans can't do it. Obviously! But we can!!

CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM - MORE QUESTIONS

There is only one reason for politics. It is the same and only reason for government: to make life better for the people. Period! There is no other reason!

It is vital that one keeps this in mind while discussing whether or not we should reform our Constitution, and if the consensus is that we should, then how we should go about it. Should we simply tinker with the present system? Is it working well, but just needs a little "tweaking" here and a little adjustment there? Bottom line: has it made life better for the people of Trinidad & Tobago? Could we have been better off if we had had another system? (Well, that last question is highly speculative, but I will still ask it for the sake of inclusion.) Could it/can it be improved upon? If so, how?

Winston Churchill once defined a Westminster type Parliamentary system as a dictatorship punctuated once every five years by three weeks of democracy.  You can readily understand his point when you realise that under our system of Government that a Prime Minister is not "primus inter pares" but simply "primus". He (or she) is the absolute boss and rules with great power. A Trinidadian type Prime Minister is more powerful inside his (or her) own country than an American type President is in his!

One of the biggest complaints that people have made since independence in 1962 is that they don't see their representatives except at election time. (Remember Churchill?!) And that is a complaint made by everybody on both sides of the political divide! And why does this happen? Because five years is a long time and the representatives know that there is no real necessity to dance attendance on their constituents all of the time. Their supporters usually vote for the political party in any case and not for the individual, so as long as their Party is popular and the M.P. sits in a "safe" seat (i.e., safe in that most voters in the particular seat vote for the particular Party) then the M.P. really doesn't have to work his seat all that hard. To be fair, there are exceptions to this generalisation and there are many hard working M.P.'s. But the truth also is that there are even more who "disappear" between elections and there are far too many M.P.'s who simply sit back and do little or nothing for their constituents. And this has always been so!!

Further, in between elections governments often ignore the electorate and are guilty of non-performance and/or trampling on the rights of citizens. These types of complaints are not new nor are they only being made today, but have been around since the 1962 Constitution.

So, the big question is: what can we do about this? Put another way, how do we, the people, get more control over the persons that we put into government so that we control them and not the other way around? Isn't it time that the dog starts to take control of its own tail again?

I have certain ideas which I will put forward, but I am deliberately not doing so now as I would prefer that readers of this blog think very carefully about the problems so that when we embark on a discussion of possible solutions that there will be no need to have a "back and forth" discussion but that we would all be "on the same page" in understanding and appreciating what exactly we are are trying to fix and why we think it needs fixing.

"THE EVIL THAT MEN DO..."

"The evil that men do lives on,
  The good is oft interred with their bones;
  So let it be with Caesar".
                                           William Shakespeare - Julius Caesar



Hugo Chavez is dead. He leaves behind him a country in chaos and a bitterly divided and polarised society. In the coming weeks and months and years Venezuela is going to struggle to pull itself out of the very deep financial blackhole that Chavez created with his 'Bolivarian socialism'. But it is important to look back and assess both his 'victories' as well as his 'defeats' (for want of better words). His victories first:

When he was elected in October 1998 (he actually first took the oath of office in January 1999) he had run a populist campaign that in itself was recolutionary. Venezuela was then divided between a very few "haves" and a lot of "have-nots". I remember going over there in 1997 and being absolutely shocked at the glaring inequalities that were rampant in that society. Clearly a revolution was absolutely necessary to bring equity and fairness to a society whose value systems seemed to be locked into those of the early fifties. There was too much inequality.

And Chavez was just that revolution. He swept to power promising massive changes for the benefit of the poor and dispossessed. In this regard he kept his promises. He brought in universal health care and gave huge opportunities to persons who would never otherwise have had them. His policies of helping the poor and dispossessed certainly raised a lot of people out of a squalid and dehabilitating poverty. He forced through changes that were absolutely necessary in a society that was atrophied and in which only the rich were able to enjoy Venezuela's fabulous oil wealth.

Now for his defeats: he did all this at great expense ... some would argue that the cost was too high. His rhetoric was extremely divisive and his actions were even more polarising. He pitted Venezuelans against each other and opened up wounds that ought never to have been opened. His critics branded him as spiteful and dictatorial. Indeed, there is a lot of evidence to support these accusations. A Supreme Court Judge, for example, who had the temerity to oppose him was arbitrarily arrested and locked up. Companies had their assets expropriated by the State and their owners received no compensation. The media was severely muzzled and criticisms against the Government were not tolerated. If you were so foolish as to criticise the President you would end up in serious hot water. Venezuela was anything but democratic.

Venezuela's economy began to suffer badly. Mr. Chavez spent a huge amount of Venezuela's oil income last year in propping up his economically failing regime so that he could win the elections in October. He won, but at a huge (and as yet unaccounted for) cost ... a cost which some experts say was the direct cause of the huge devaluation that Venezuela's currency suffered last month.

In the meantime, there has been absolutely no investment by the private sector in Venezuela's factories and businesses for at least the last 8 years. In the oil/energy sector Chavez's purge of Stae owned PDVSA some 10 years ago has resulted in oil production falling (at a time of rising oil prices) and a lot of incompetent personnel running the company effectively into the ground. Corruption in high office is rampant. Many 'Chavistas' are multi millionaires with condos in Miami.

In terms of foreign policy it could also be argued that this also was a disaster for Venezuela. Venezuelan oil subsidies have been propping up Cuba to the tune of about US$9 billion per annum for the last decade or so. What the Castros are going to do now is going to be interesting, to say the least. My guess is that they will try to prop up the Vice President Nicholas Maduro, a former bus driver. But I don't think that he will be able to hold the centre for very long. The only countries that seemed to support Chavez were countries like Iran, Ghaddiffi's Libya, Zimbabwe (remember Robert Mugabe?) and North Korea. To be fair, he did have some friends in Latin America like Bolivia's Evo Morales. But you know what they say about 'show me your friends ...'!

And by the way, if you think that crime is bad in T&T you should check out Caracas sometime. Their crime problems make ours look like a walk in the park!

Venezuela is in for a hard time now that Chavez is dead. There is no one on the horizon who has his charisma and the divisions in the society are too deep to heal overnight. The bad news is that Venezuela's economy is in a shambles and there is nobody in the present Government who has the economic savvy to be able to fix it ... ever! The good news is that Venezuela is essentially fabulously wealthy ... at least potentially so. Now that Chavez is dead it is quite likely that the country will sooner or later move back to the centre and will become once again a nice place to live. Let us hope that in moving back to the centre that the good things that Chavez did do are not buried with him ... although that would surprise a lot of people including old Willy Shakespeare.






       

A QUESTION OF LOYALTY

I had intended to devote the next few posts to the question of constitutional reform, but a short (and rather devastating) bout of pneumonia laid me up while events have taken over in the interim. I am talking about the raging 'brouhaha' over the (seemingly) stillborn Flying Squad issue.

Let me tell you a story: in 1969 my father was the then Minister of Home Affairs (this ministry later became the Ministry of National Security). Sometime around September/October of that year my father took a note to Cabinet recommending that three young Sandhurst trained lieutenants, LaSalle, Shah and Barzey, be cashiered from the Regiment. The security service had reported that they were in cahoots with the Black Power elements in the country and were actively engaged in plotting revolution and the violent overthrow of the Government. Unfortunately, none of the evidence was justiciable and even to expose it would have exposed the security personnel in such a way that would render them useless as sources of future information. In other words, there was no proof that could have been used by the Government against them and there was no way of getting that proof.

The then Attorney General, George Richards, bitterly opposed the recommendation to fire the young lieutenants on the ground that there being absolutely no evidence against them, they would win a case against
the Government for wrongful dismissal and the Government would have to pay them huge damages. My father's reply was that the Government would be better off paying those damages rather than paying for the costs of a revolution which could well end up with the entire Cabinet facing a firing squad. Eric Williams, who was then Prime Minister, told my father that he was being overly dramatic and sided with his Attorney General. The rest is history! (Incidentally, this was not the only time in the build up to the events of 1970 that Dr. Williams did not take my father's advice. But that is another story (or stories).)

Shortly after the 1970 uprisings had been put down Dr. Williams called my father to his office and congratulated him on all that he had done in putting down the uprisings and in keeping loss of life to an absolute minimum. About two weeks after this Dr. Williams called my father again to his office and demanded his resignation. Dr. Willaims said that the Party (the PNM) was howling for my father's blood as there were elements in the Party who were claiming (with some justification because they did not have the facts) that the national security lapses that resulted in the uprisings and army mutiny were the fault of the Minister of Home Affairs. My father's attitude was "let them come. I can defend myself against any and all accusations and show where, if what I had recommended had been done, that the mutiny and uprisings would not have taken place".  "Ah!" Williams replied. "But then they will come after me!"

In other words, he recognised full well that he had screwed up and that either my father had to fall on his sword or that the whole Government would come crashing down as my father's defence of himself would have dragged not only the Prime Minister down, but the whole Cabinet as well. In a situation where the whole country was in an extremely shaky state and where the very pillars of our democracy had been seriously threatened (remember, we had only achieved independence a short 9 years earlier) my father realised that he had no choice but to go, and to go quietly. Not to do so would have threatened the very existance of his Government. By saving himself all he would do is "kill" his Government and he would go down with the rest. In other words, either he went or they all went. He went.

 He kept his peace on this until he died in 2005 although he never tired of telling us (his family) the stories of what really happened until we could all repeat them practically word for word.

I tell this story now as an example of what is supposed to happen and how Cabinet Government is supposed to operate. We are all still waiting for an explanation about this Flying Squad imbroglio and speaking for myself only, I must confess that there are too many elements in the story that simply do not add up or make sense. What does make sense, to me at least, is that the Prime Minister is being horribly exposed when she should not be. If a Prime Minister falls then his or her entire Government usually also falls. This is a lesson that appears not to be understood by those close to Mrs. Persad-Bissessar.

 I like Jack Warner a lot. Oh! I am well aware of the stories that continue to swirl around his head and I have no illusions. I honestly don't. But I do like him and think that he has a lot of strengths to bring to the table. However, I am most concerned that this present trouble is such that even if he is able to survive it that his continued presence as National Security Minister may cripple the Government. In which case, he may be finding that even if he is completely blameless in this matter (just as I say without apology that my father was completely blameless in 1970) that he ought seriously to consider whether or not it is best for the sake of his Prime Minister, his Government and his Party that he step aside quietly.

CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM - QUESTIONS

There have been certain significant developments over the last two months that have pointed to the operation of our Constitution and raised the question of constitutional reform. The first development was the clean sweep of all 12 seats in the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) by the People's National Movement (PNM) leaving the opposition without a voice in the THA. Certain persons have been calling for some sort of appointment of non-elected assemblymen by the President of the Republic to correct this imbalance, which I honestly don't think falls within the President's powers ... but that is another story.

The second development was the election of a new President (and by the way, congratulations are in order to Mr. Carmona ... an excellent choice!) and all the "kerfuffle" that surrounded the process before the eventual nominee (Mr. Carmona) was announced.

It seemed to me that the opposition PNM was really making mountains out of molehills with their agitation before the announcement that Mr. Carmona was going to be the Government's nominee and they were singularly ungracious in their subsequent behaviour following the announcement. But again, that is also another story.

I had rather deliberately refrained from commenting on these matters for several reasons, not the least being that I really didn't feel like getting involved in any way in the politics and politicing that was taking place, nor did I feel like commenting on them. Maybe tomorrow or next week or next year I will comment on the politics again, but right now I am more concerned with trying to be part of a non-political process that will move our twin island Republic forward ... not to go around in circles.

What I really want to focus on is the simple question: is there a need for constitutional reform? If the answer is 'no', well there's an end to it. But if the answer is 'yes', then a number of sub-questions follow: why do you say that there is a need? What is working? What is not working? Where is our present Constitution falling short? Where, if necessary, can it be improved? Should we really have an executive President? If  you think that we should, then why do you say so? If you think that we shouldn't, then why do you think not? What would be the advantages to us in having an executive President? What would the disadvantages be?

There are probably other questions that arise which I just can't think of at the moment, but my point here is that no serious or proper discussions on reforming or revising our Constitution unless and until we are all absolutely clear on what exactly we are trying to achieve. When we know what it is that we want to achieve then we can discuss intelligently how to go about it. You can't get an answer to anything when you don't know the question or the question is not clear.

I have ideas on whether reform is needed and what exactly we should do and I will put them forward in subsequent posts. At the moment, though, I prefer to begin this discussion simply by posing the questions and letting them sink in. This way I hope to direct everyone's minds to these serious issues and thus be better able to understand the subsequent posts on this subject. Incidentally, if you do have ideas on other questions that ought to be addressed or considered on this subject please let me know. My list is not meant to be conclusive.

So, watch this space if this is a topic that interests you. The next few posts will be dealing with it.