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Tuesday, February 18, 2025

Wilson tells of flaw in Robinson's character

by

20110502

It was not for­mer Na­tion­al Al­liance for Re­con­struc­tion (NAR) prime min­is­ter Arthur NR Robin­son's lead­er­ship style that made him un­pop­u­lar with the mass­es in 1990 but, rather, his per­son­al­i­ty.

For­mer fi­nance min­is­ter in the NAR gov­ern­ment, Sel­by Wil­son, giv­ing ev­i­dence at the Caribbean Court of Jus­tice yes­ter­day be­fore the Com­mis­sion of En­quiry in­to the 1990 at­tempt­ed coup, spoke of Robin­son's char­ac­ter flaw, even as he stout­ly de­fend­ed his style of gov­er­nance. He said: "He al­ways ap­peared a lit­tle too stiff. He didn't have a nat­u­ral­ly warm per­son­al­i­ty. He was clin­i­cal to the point. "He was a very for­mal and prop­er man. He didn't have the kind of charis­ma that Man­ning (Patrick) and Pan­day (Bas­deo) ex­ud­ed," Wil­son told the com­mis­sion.

Wil­son, re­spond­ing to a ques­tion from com­mis­sion­er East­lyn McKen­zie, added: "I don't think his lead­er­ship was in­ap­pro­pri­ate. "I think it was his per­son­al­i­ty. He trust­ed my good judg­ment (as fi­nance min­is­ter) and I was a fierce de­fend­er of what­ev­er pol­i­cy he put in place." He said the NAR clear­ly stat­ed in its 1986 man­i­festo that eco­nom­ic re­struc­tur­ing was nec­es­sary and put sev­er­al pro­grammes in place, es­pe­cial­ly to al­le­vi­ate the suf­fer­ing of the less for­tu­nate. He blamed a com­mu­ni­ca­tion deficit for the ig­no­rance of mass­es about those things.

Fur­ther, it was for­mer Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress leader Bas­deo Pan­day who, us­ing the race el­e­ment af­ter the 1988 split in the NAR coali­tion, suc­ceed­ed in paint­ing Robin­son in a cer­tain light, Wil­son told the com­mis­sion. He said: "The race el­e­ment in pol­i­tics be­came more promi­nent when Club 88 (com­pris­ing dis­si­dent UNC mem­bers of the NAR) was es­tab­lished. "Pan­day had to re­sort to el­e­vat­ing the race el­e­ment in pol­i­tics to make the split. "Win­ston Dook­er­an (NAR MP) said he wouldn't win the Ch­agua­nas seat again be­cause he elect­ed to stay with the NAR. "Pan­day called him a neemakaram, some­one who turns on his peo­ple. Em­manuel Ho­sein (an­oth­er NAR MP) suf­fered the same fate."

On the is­sue of the pre­vail­ing cli­mate of dis­con­tent in the so­ci­ety at the time, Wil­son told the com­mis­sion it was er­ro­neous to link that with the coup at­tempt. He said the Ja­maat al Mus­limeen, who staged the 1990 in­sur­rec­tion, was em­bold­ened and em­pow­ered by peo­ple of all lev­els in so­ci­ety for dif­fer­ent rea­sons. He said that in­clud­ed busi­ness peo­ple who hired them as debt col­lec­tors. Wil­son said un­der the PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion, pre­ced­ing the NAR regime, the then na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty min­is­ter did not en­force a court judg­ment con­cern­ing the Mu­cu­rapo land is­sue. Fur­ther, over the years, he said, both the Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment and the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress used the Ja­maat in their elec­tion cam­paigns.

He added: "There are al­le­ga­tions that the Ja­maat was in­volved in the 1991 cam­paign of the PNM and the 1995 UNC cam­paign. "This was com­mon knowl­edge on the street. There were state­ments by Bakr him­self that he as­sist­ed one par­ty or an­oth­er." Wil­son said there were al­le­ga­tions that even the NAR had the sup­port of the Ja­maat in its 1986 gen­er­al elec­tion cam­paign. He said he dis­tinct­ly re­called the Mus­limeen in­sur­gents when they stormed the Red House on Ju­ly 27, 1990, say­ing they had in­struc­tions to let Pan­day go. Wil­son said: "I could on­ly as­sume those in­struc­tions came from Bakr. "There was a fair amount of pan­der­ing to that group. I think we reap what we sow." (YB)


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