?Founder of the Joint Con­sul­ta­tive Coun­cil on the Con­struc­tion In­dus­try (JCC) and Chair­man of NH In­ter­na­tion­al (Caribbean) Ltd, Emile Elias, says Prime Min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning de­c­la­ra­tion of war against the con­struc­tion sec­tor makes him sad.

Elias said the on­ly time in his life when he felt as sad was when his par­ents died. Elias said the Prime Min­is­ter was a friend of the JCC up to 2005 when he pre­sent­ed a White Pa­per on Pro­cure­ment to the Par­lia­ment.

Elias said the Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts (NA­PA), which he called the Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Non-Per­form­ing Arts, was "a scar on the soul of our na­tion. It is a scar on the land­scape of the cap­i­tal city." The fa­cil­i­ty was con­struct­ed un­der the man­age­ment of Ude­cott and has been the source of con­cern from some artistes in T&T, who claim it was not suit­able for them.

Elias re­quest­ed new Leader of the Op­po­si­tion, Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar promise she would move to have In­tegri­ty in pub­lic life in­clude ly­ing in the dis­charge of one's pub­lic du­ty an of­fence "as se­ri­ous as fail­ing to de­clare one's as­sets." He said the Patrick Man­ning Gov­ern­ment "lost its moral com­pass, so we may need to leg­is­late a lit­tle more moral­i­ty." Elias said it was not true to say con­tracts award­ed to for­eign con­trac­tors were de­liv­ered with­in time and bud­get as claimed by Man­ning.

Elias al­so wants Per­sad-Bisses­sar to move to amend the Free­dom of In­for­ma­tion Act to com­pel the re­lease of re­quest­ed in­for­ma­tion. Elias is­sued a fresh call on Pres­i­dent George Maxwell Richards to re­voke the ap­point­ment of In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor Michael An­nisette.