KEVON FELMINE

Se­nior Re­porter

kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

June was event­ful in pol­i­tics, as the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) and the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) geared up for by-elec­tions and in­ter­nal polls that some saw as a lit­mus test for the 2025 gen­er­al elec­tions. It was rid­dled with po­lit­i­cal con­tro­ver­sies, labour un­rest, le­gal bat­tles and, un­for­tu­nate­ly, a con­tin­u­ance of crime and vi­o­lence that showed no signs of let­ting up.

Pol­i­tics

As the UNC cam­paigned for re-elec­tion in the Quinam/Morne Di­a­blo and Lengua/In­di­an Walk dis­tricts, po­lit­i­cal leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar promised to re­open the Petrotrin Pointe-a-Pierre re­fin­ery if her par­ty wins the 2025 gen­er­al elec­tions. She al­so pledged to ex­pand the Gov­ern­ment As­sis­tance for Tu­ition Ex­pens­es (GATE) pro­gramme and pro­vide lap­tops for sec­ondary school stu­dents and tablets for pri­ma­ry school pupils. On crime, she re­it­er­at­ed her in­ten­tion to in­tro­duce Stand Your Ground leg­is­la­tion to al­low cit­i­zens to de­fend them­selves.

The UNC al­so pre­pared for its in­ter­nal elec­tions, with busi­ness­man Robert Amar sign­ing up to con­test a deputy leader post and new faces, in­clud­ing for­mer NIPDEC chair­man Ham­lyn Jailal and Ca­roni Cen­tral MP Arnold Ram, en­ter­ing the fray.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar pub­licly lament­ed per­ceived be­tray­al with­in the par­ty, al­leg­ing treach­ery by an MP who sits be­side her in Par­lia­ment. Dis­si­dent Na­pari­ma MP Rod­ney Charles de­fend­ed his stance, cit­ing in­tegri­ty and ethics, while Rush­ton Paray crit­i­cised the lead­er­ship but re­frained from dam­ag­ing the par­ty’s rep­u­ta­tion.

Ten­sions deep­ened when Cu­mu­to/Man­zanil­la MP Dr Rai Rag­bir vot­ed with the Gov­ern­ment to amend the Whistle­blow­er Pro­tec­tion Bill, cit­ing its im­por­tance in tack­ling cor­rup­tion.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar ar­gued that the amend­ment breached pri­va­cy rights. Rag­bir ex­pect­ed ex­pul­sion but de­fend­ed his de­ci­sion, ref­er­enc­ing pub­lic con­cerns about cor­rup­tion at the San­gre Grande Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion. A dis­ci­pli­nary team was lat­er formed to in­ves­ti­gate his ac­tions.

On June 17, the UNC re­tained to­tal dom­i­nance in the Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion, with Sarah Sookdeo de­feat­ing the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment’s (PNM) An­der­son Nanan. How­ev­er, the UNC lost ground in Princes Town, where the PNM’s pas­tor Aut­ly Granthume best­ed Nicole Gopaul. An­a­lysts sug­gest­ed the PNM’s gains in mar­gin­al ar­eas like Moru­ga/Table­land could in­di­cate mo­men­tum ahead of the 2025 gen­er­al elec­tions.

Sep­a­rate­ly, Min­is­ter of Youth De­vel­op­ment and Na­tion­al Ser­vice Fos­ter Cum­mings filed a law­suit against the State over a leaked T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) re­port re­vealed pub­licly by Op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor Jayan­ti Lutch­me­di­al. Cum­mings al­leged a breach of con­fi­den­tial­i­ty, while Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley main­tained that le­gal re­course is a right.

The is­suance of “silk” al­so sparked con­tro­ver­sy. Crit­ics ques­tioned Min­is­ter of Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Faris Al-Rawi’s el­e­va­tion to se­nior coun­sel, while oth­ers called for an in­de­pen­dent pan­el to re­view ap­point­ments, an is­sue which had been raised be­fore in sev­er­al quar­ters, in­clud­ing the Law As­so­ci­a­tion.

Mean­while, for­mer MP Nile­ung Hy­po­lite ap­pealed for help to fund ur­gent can­cer treat­ment.

On June 22, the PNM opened nom­i­na­tions for prospec­tive can­di­dates for UNC-held con­stituen­cies, with Row­ley ex­press­ing con­fi­dence about the up­com­ing gen­er­al elec­tions, urg­ing sup­port­ers to re­main ready.

Econ­o­my

The con­tro­ver­sy sur­round­ing a $2.6 bil­lion ac­count­ing dis­crep­an­cy in the Min­istry of Fi­nance’s au­dit­ed fi­nan­cial ac­counts for 2023 es­ca­lat­ed, as High Court Judge West­min James de­nied Au­di­tor Gen­er­al Jai­wantie Ram­dass leave for a ju­di­cial re­view of a Cab­i­net-ini­ti­at­ed in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to her con­duct. Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert ini­ti­at­ed the probe, but Ram­dass prompt­ly ap­pealed.

On June 21, the Court of Ap­peal over­turned James’ de­ci­sion, grant­i­ng Ram­dass leave to pro­ceed. Hours lat­er, Im­bert an­nounced plans to seek leave to take the mat­ter to the Privy Coun­cil, which the Court of Ap­peal even­tu­al­ly ap­proved.

Mean­while, the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the Rev­enue Au­thor­i­ty (TTRA) was stayed un­til Sep­tem­ber as the Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion (PSA) pur­sued its Privy Coun­cil ap­peal.

Dur­ing the mid-year bud­get re­view on June 7, Im­bert re­vealed a pro­ject­ed $3 bil­lion rev­enue loss for 2024, pri­mar­i­ly due to low gas prices. To man­age the short­fall, he pre­sent­ed a $2.3 bil­lion sup­ple­men­tary bud­get for mu­nic­i­pal cor­po­ra­tions, the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA), ser­vice com­mis­sions, and oth­er min­istries. Im­bert dis­missed Op­po­si­tion Leader Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s claims of planned CDAP cuts and VAT in­creas­es.

How­ev­er, the Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce ex­pressed con­cerns over the widen­ing fis­cal deficit, urg­ing fis­cal in­cen­tives and pub­lic-pri­vate part­ner­ships to stim­u­late non-en­er­gy sec­tor growth.

Econ­o­mist Dr Vaalmik­ki Ar­joon high­light­ed the need for a for­eign ex­change fa­cil­i­ty for small and medi­um en­ter­pris­es, sug­gest­ing it could low­er the cost of liv­ing if im­ple­ment­ed ef­fec­tive­ly.

On June 24, THA Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine un­veiled a $3.9 bil­lion bud­get, al­lo­cat­ing $2.81 bil­lion for re­cur­rent ex­pen­di­ture, $1 bil­lion for de­vel­op­ment pro­grammes, $91.9 mil­lion for URP, and $43.8 mil­lion for CEPEP. Au­gus­tine em­pha­sised sus­tain­able air trav­el and re­ject­ed the Rev­enue Au­thor­i­ty and Prop­er­ty Tax. How­ev­er, Mi­nor­i­ty Leader Kelvin Mor­ris crit­i­cised the bud­get for fail­ing to re­duce de­pen­dence on the THA, which em­ploys 70 per cent of the is­land’s work­force. Au­gus­tine al­so an­nounced the ap­point­ment of for­mer chief man­age­ment ac­coun­tant Petal-Ann Roberts as Sec­re­tary of Fi­nance, Trade, and Econ­o­my.

Crime

Cana­di­an YouTu­ber Chris “Chris Must List” Hugh­es faced sedi­tion charges af­ter videos sur­faced of him in­ter­view­ing gang mem­bers in crime hotspots. De­tained for a week, Hugh­es was lat­er grant­ed bail and al­lowed to leave T&T. While Hugh­es main­tained he did noth­ing wrong, Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds raised con­cerns over the coun­try’s in­ter­na­tion­al rep­u­ta­tion. Le­gal ex­perts not­ed the dif­fi­cul­ty of prov­ing sedi­tion un­der the law, which re­quires ev­i­dence of in­cit­ing vi­o­lence or pub­lic dis­or­der.

The TTPS con­tin­ued its an­ti-gang op­er­a­tions, charg­ing sev­en of 22 sus­pects un­der the An­ti-Gang Act. Mean­while, mur­ders linked to gang ac­tiv­i­ty per­sist­ed, in­clud­ing the killings of Den­nis Ju­goon and oth­ers in mass shoot­ings, such as the Bel­mont at­tack dur­ing a foot­ball match, which claimed the lives of Pe­ter Williams, Kevin King, Johnathon Ar­joon and the wound­ing of three oth­ers. The gun­men even­tu­al­ly went to the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal (PoS­GH) to fin­ish up the sur­viv­ing vic­tim, in­jur­ing more peo­ple.

The Po­lice Ser­vice of­fered a $100,000 re­ward for in­for­ma­tion as Prime Min­is­ter Row­ley called for pub­lic part­ner­ship in com­bat­ing crime. Row­ley stressed that crime-fight­ing ex­pen­di­tures were strain­ing na­tion­al re­sources, em­pha­sis­ing the need for greater pub­lic co­op­er­a­tion and ac­count­abil­i­ty. Hinds sup­port­ed en­forc­ing the death penal­ty still in the law­books.

Oth­er vi­o­lent in­ci­dents in­clud­ed the stab­bing and burn­ing of 74-year-old Hen­ry Mun­gal in a sus­pect­ed land dis­pute and the fa­tal shoot­ing of Mic­ah “Bam­boo Man” Singh in Gol­con­da. A 15-year-old was fa­tal­ly stabbed in En­ter­prise dur­ing a “play fight,” and a 12-year-old girl sur­vived a shoot­ing in Diego Mar­tin. In San Fer­nan­do, Adri­an Cal­liste was gunned down af­ter sur­viv­ing a pri­or at­tempt on his life.

Crimes of con­cern ex­tend­ed to child abuse, with a two-year-old in Cou­va dy­ing from blunt force trau­ma while in a babysit­ter’s care. In Matu­ra, three young men were mur­dered dur­ing a rob­bery. Nurse Sad­na Gan­goo was al­so gunned down out­side the Princes Town Dis­trict Health Fa­cil­i­ty, sus­pect­ed to be linked to black­mail.

Tac­ti­cal po­lice units raised alarms about out­dat­ed bul­let­proof vests amid ris­ing con­fronta­tions with heav­i­ly armed crim­i­nals. Pub­lic crit­i­cism mount­ed against Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher, with le­gal chal­lenges from of­fi­cers over pro­mo­tion dis­crep­an­cies and in­creased com­plaints against po­lice.

The US State De­part­ment up­grad­ed T&T’s sta­tus in its Traf­fick­ing in Per­sons Re­port, recog­nis­ing Gov­ern­ment ef­forts while high­light­ing short­com­ings. The Po­lice Com­plaints Au­thor­i­ty (PCA) praised the TTPS for ad­dress­ing rogue of­fi­cers and re­duc­ing hu­man traf­fick­ing cas­es linked to po­lice.

Labour

Labour Day cel­e­bra­tions in Fyz­abad high­light­ed ten­sions be­tween trade unions and the Gov­ern­ment, with the Joint Trade Union Move­ment (JTUM) pledg­ing to work with the UNC and oth­er par­ties to oust the PNM.

JTUM pres­i­dent gen­er­al An­cel Ro­get pro­posed form­ing a Na­tion­al Front Al­liance against “cor­rup­tion and mal-gov­er­nance.”

Pub­lic Ser­vice As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Leroy Bap­tiste en­dorsed the UNC, ac­cus­ing the PNM of ne­glect­ing trade unions. In con­trast, the Uni­fied Teach­ers As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) re­mained neu­tral.

Labour Min­is­ter Stephen Mc Clashie not­ed work­force con­tri­bu­tions, high­light­ing the na­tion­al min­i­mum wage in­crease to $20. How­ev­er, Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar la­belled the Gov­ern­ment “an­ti-work­er,” cit­ing the Pointe-a-Pierre re­fin­ery clo­sure. Row­ley dis­missed JTUM’s al­liance with the UNC as “noth­ing new,” re­call­ing past part­ner­ships.

Ed­u­ca­tion

June saw es­ca­lat­ing school vi­o­lence, with a 15-year-old stu­dent stabbed dur­ing a fight at Barataria North Sec­ondary.

Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly wel­comed the re­ver­sal of the Caribbean Ex­am­i­na­tions Coun­cil’s (CXC) de­ci­sion to drop cer­tain tech­ni­cal sub­jects fol­low­ing back­lash. How­ev­er, SEA re­sults re­vealed that 43 per cent of stu­dents scored be­low 50 per cent, draw­ing crit­i­cism from op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor David Nakhid.

Dengue fever added chal­lenges.

Cara­pichaima West Sec­ondary School teach­ers left their class­rooms ear­ly due to a mos­qui­to in­fes­ta­tion, as stu­dents wrote ex­am­i­na­tions out­side. TTUTA urged ad­her­ence to Health Min­istry guide­lines for mos­qui­to con­trol.

Mean­while, reg­is­tra­tion for mi­grant chil­dren in schools be­gan slow­ly, rais­ing con­cerns about in­te­gra­tion.

Health

The Chron­ic Dis­ease As­sis­tance Pro­gramme (CDAP) faced fund­ing chal­lenges as the Health Min­istry sought $495 mil­lion in sup­ple­men­tal fund­ing. For­mer Health Min­is­ter Fuad Khan warned ris­ing costs could jeop­ar­dise free health­care, ad­vo­cat­ing for a con­tri­bu­tion sys­tem.

Dengue cas­es surged, with 123 cas­es re­port­ed by mid-June, com­pared to 11 in 2023. Health Min­is­ter Ter­rence Deyals­ingh em­pha­sised pre­ven­ta­tive mea­sures, warn­ing against over-re­liance on spray­ing.

Se­cu­ri­ty con­cerns al­so plagued hos­pi­tals, prompt­ing tighter mea­sures af­ter shoot­ings at the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal and staff fears at Ari­ma Hos­pi­tal fol­low­ing a dead­ly shoot­ing.

In­fra­struc­ture

Protests over de­te­ri­o­rat­ing roads per­sist­ed, with res­i­dents blam­ing Gov­ern­ment in­ac­tion. The Gov­ern­ment an­nounced the clo­sure of the Sec­ondary Roads Re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion and Im­prove­ment Com­pa­ny, cit­ing in­ef­fi­cien­cy af­ter two years of op­er­a­tion.

As the rainy sea­son ap­proached, cit­i­zens got a taste of things to come as iso­lat­ed show­ers on June 4 left low­er and east­ern Port-of-Spain, Mar­aval, and Diego Mar­tin flood­ed. The month end­ed with the ar­rival of Hur­ri­cane Beryl. Even be­fore it hit land, gusts of wind dam­aged and up­root­ed trees in com­mu­ni­ties along Trinidad’s east coast.