Yvonne Ba­boolal

Hous­ing Min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mooni­lal has dis­missed as "wild spec­u­la­tions," al­le­ga­tions that Jack Warn­er's min­is­te­r­i­al port­fo­lio was down­sized be­cause Cab­i­net col­leagues were en­vi­ous of his grow­ing pop­u­lar­i­ty. Mooni­lal was re­spond­ing to an ar­ti­cle in yes­ter­day's Sun­day Guardian in which "sources" claimed that Warn­er's for­mer Min­istry of Works and Trans­port was cut down to Min­istry of Works in or­der to put a check on his grow­ing pop­u­lar­i­ty. The sources claimed that Warn­er's pop­u­lar­i­ty was be­gin­ning to over­shad­ow that of Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

Mooni­lal, in an in­ter­view yes­ter­day, said: "It is re­gret­table. They are wild spec­u­la­tions. "Warn­er is a very en­er­getic and com­mit­ted mem­ber of our team." Mooni­lal said peren­ni­al prob­lems in the area of drainage and in­fra­struc­ture had plagued the na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty, par­tic­u­lar­ly in rur­al ar­eas. He said Warn­er was giv­en a very chal­leng­ing min­istry and the Gov­ern­ment was very con­fi­dent about his de­liv­ery in this area. "The Works Min­istry re­mains one of the biggest in the coun­try. If that is down­siz­ing, what would up­siz­ing be?" he asked.

Mooni­lal al­so re­called that when the Works and Trans­port Min­istry was split in 2008, it led to enor­mous suc­cess in both ar­eas and caused mil­lions of dol­lars to be saved. He said Per­sad-Bisses­sar en­gaged in deep con­sul­ta­tion with all Cab­i­net mem­bers and mem­bers of the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship coali­tion be­fore her Gov­ern­ment's re­cent Cab­i­net reshuf­fle. "This was un­prece­dent­ed in the his­to­ry of our West­min­ster style pol­i­tics," Mooni­lal said. "No oth­er prime min­is­ter has done this be­fore."