Kim­ber­ly Mack­han

Ca­roni East MP Dr Tim Gopeesingh said cor­rup­tion is King in T&T. He told mem­bers of the Low­er House dur­ing yes­ter­day's de­bate on the 2009/10 na­tion­al bud­get that there was no ac­count­abil­i­ty of lead­er­ship and no trust in au­thor­i­ty in T&T.

"The Gov­ern­ment is guilty of fla­grant, bla­tant, open nepo­tism, cor­rup­tion and lack of in­tegri­ty and moral­i­ty in pub­lic af­fairs," he said. He added: "We are be­ing sucked dis­con­cert­ing­ly in­to a pre­car­i­ous mael­strom of anom­ic in­ter­nal con­flict, in­sta­bil­i­ty and in­se­cu­ri­ty. This Gov­ern­ment has poi­soned and cor­rod­ed every as­pect of pub­lic life and of what we once knew as in­de­pen­dent in­sti­tu­tions." Gopeesingh raised con­cern about the re­struc­ture of T&T's na­tion­al air­line.

"BWIA (was) re­struc­tured to Caribbean Air­lines for $1.5 bil­lion. What was that? A change of the bird on the tail of the air­craft? This same PNM gov­ern­ment sold 25 per cent of BWIA to Ed Ack­er in the 1990s for $10 mil­lion. This same Caribbean Air­lines con­sid­ered pur­chas­ing a los­ing air­line, Air Ja­maica. Who are the play­ers in Caribbean Air­lines?" asked Gopeesingh. "Are they the same play­ers with WASA and Cli­co's new man­age­ment? What a cor­rupt mess. Same BWIA which wants to pay their mi­nor­i­ty share­hold­ers 22 cents per share, but us­es tax­pay­ers' $1.5 bil­lion to re­struc­ture," he said.