Renu­ka Singh

Cab­i­net is still de­lib­er­at­ing the ap­point­ment of a chair­man and board at State-owned Na­tion­al Quar­ries (NQ).The stalled de­ci­sion, the T&T Guardian un­der­stands, stems from a dead­lock be­tween two min­is­ters who have each hand­picked a po­ten­tial can­di­date for the chair­man­ship po­si­tion.Fi­nance Min­is­ter Lar­ry Howai, who was re­spon­si­ble for the dis­missal of for­mer NQ chair­man, Mi­tra Ramkhele­wan, yes­ter­day con­firmed no ap­point­ment had been made.

"The mat­ter is still un­der de­lib­er­a­tion by Cab­i­net," he said in re­sponse to e-mailed ques­tions.The State-owned com­pa­ny has been with­out a chair­man and a board since Oc­to­ber 25.Howai said un­til Cab­i­net de­cid­ed on the mat­ter "the cor­po­rate sec­re­tary re­mains the of­fi­cer in charge at the com­pa­ny."The Min­istry of En­er­gy and En­er­gy Af­fairs," he added, "main­tains a watch­ing brief of the com­pa­ny."

Howai said when the ap­point­ment was even­tu­al­ly made, it would not be an in­ter­im board but a per­ma­nent one.For­mer chair­man of the San­gre Grande Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion, Kesh­war Ma­haraj, has been tipped to take over the chair­man­ship.The T&T Guardian un­der­stands Ma­haraj is be­ing favoured by one min­is­ter and that is con­tribut­ing to the stymied ap­point­ment.