Gov­ern­ment yes­ter­day un­veiled a new board of di­rec­tors for the Ex­port-Im­port Bank of Trinidad and To­ba­go (Ex­im­Bank), the state fi­nan­cial com­pa­ny that has been at­tacked by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

Ap­point­ed to serve two-year terms are Ed­win Chari­ah as chair­man, Suresh Ma­haraj as deputy chair­man and di­rec­tors Nan­di­ni Nar­ine, Bhushan Singh and Joseph Ridge Paul.

The for­mal pre­sen­ta­tion of in­stru­ments took place yes­ter­day at the Min­istry of Trade, In­vest­ment, and Tourism head­quar­ters in Port of Spain dur­ing a brief cer­e­mo­ny.

Satyaka­ma Ma­haraj, Min­is­ter of Trade, In­vest­ment, and Tourism, presided over the pro­ceed­ings.

In his re­marks, Ma­haraj em­pha­sised the crit­i­cal role of Ex­im­Bank in ad­vanc­ing the coun­try’s non-en­er­gy ex­ports and man­u­fac­tur­ing sec­tors. He high­light­ed that the bank con­tin­ues to be in­stru­men­tal in en­hanc­ing for­eign ex­change earn­ings, gen­er­at­ing and sus­tain­ing em­ploy­ment and sup­port­ing the lo­cal ex­port­ing com­mu­ni­ty through its trade fi­nance port­fo­lio.

The min­is­ter added that the new­ly con­sti­tut­ed board is ex­pect­ed to build on these achieve­ments, en­sur­ing the com­pa­ny re­mains at the fore­front of ef­forts to di­ver­si­fy the econ­o­my and strength­en the coun­try’s glob­al com­pet­i­tive­ness.

The ap­point­ment of the new board comes at a time when Ex­im­Bank has been un­der height­ened pub­lic scruti­ny. Ear­li­er this month, the in­sti­tu­tion was thrust in­to the spot­light af­ter a dai­ly news­pa­per ar­ti­cle pub­lished de­tailed da­ta show­ing that phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal and poul­try com­pa­nies dom­i­nat­ed for­eign ex­change al­lo­ca­tions over the past five years.

Ac­cord­ing to the fig­ures, the bank dis­trib­uted a to­tal of US$1.4 bil­lion in for­eign ex­change to 123 com­pa­nies un­der the es­sen­tial win­dow be­tween 2020 and mid-2025. The al­lo­ca­tions re­vealed that some of the largest ben­e­fi­cia­ries in­clud­ed Arawak and Com­pa­ny Ltd with over US$76.2 mil­lion, Nu­trim­ix with US$78.5 mil­lion, and Smith Robert­son and Com­pa­ny Ltd now Aven­ta T&T with US$100.1 mil­lion. Oth­er no­table al­lo­ca­tions went to Prices­mart Clubs TT with US$44.3 mil­lion, Bry­den PI Ltd with US$29.2 mil­lion, Pen­ny­wise Cos­met­ics Ltd with US$51.8 mil­lion, and Vem­co (a di­vi­sion of CDP Trinidad Lim­it­ed, now ACA­DO), which re­ceived US$19.3 mil­lion.

The da­ta al­so showed that sev­er­al com­pa­nies were able to ac­cess ad­di­tion­al forex un­der the man­u­fac­tur­ing win­dow for the pe­ri­od 2018 to June 30, 2025. Arawak and Com­pa­ny Ltd re­ceived US$64.4 mil­lion, Nu­trim­ix Feeds Ltd se­cured US$53.5 mil­lion, and Vem­co ac­cessed US$33.3 mil­lion.

The rev­e­la­tions reignit­ed de­bate in the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty and among the wider pub­lic about trans­paren­cy, eq­ui­ty, and the cri­te­ria guid­ing for­eign ex­change dis­tri­b­u­tion in Trinidad and To­ba­go.