Richard Lord

Po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Bish­nu Ra­goonath says the hous­ing ac­com­mo­da­tion pro­vid­ed by busi­ness­man Ralph Gopaul to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar was a gift which has to be re­port­ed to the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion. He said so in re­sponse to ques­tions on moves by Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley to write to the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion to in­ves­ti­gate the mat­ter. Row­ley said Per­sad-Bisses­sar was in breach of the In­tegri­ty in Pub­lic Life Act when she ac­cept­ed the ac­com­mo­da­tion at the house in Pasea, Tu­na­puna.

She stayed at the res­i­dence over a six-month pe­ri­od last year, it was re­port­ed. "Dr Row­ley is cor­rect in that re­gard. That it is a gift," Ra­goonath said, adding he was not sure the time pe­ri­od re­quired by law for the re­port­ing of that gift to the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion had ex­pired as yet. Per­sad-Bisses­sar ad­mit­ted on Tues­day Gopaul and his wife, Mau­reen, "were friends" of hers and she stayed at his home for more than six months at no ad­di­tion­al cost to the tax­pay­ers of T&T.

Gopaul was short­list­ed for a $40 mil­lion trans­port con­tract from state-owned Na­tion­al Pe­tro­le­um Mar­ket­ing Com­pa­ny Ltd (NP). At least three Gov­ern­ment min­is­ters have said, while Gopaul's com­pa­ny won the bid, a con­tract was not award­ed as yet. The mat­ter is be­ing probed by an in­de­pen­dent team ap­point­ed by En­er­gy Min­is­ter Car­olyn Seep­er­sad-Bachan. The team is ex­pect­ed to sub­mit its re­port ear­ly next week.