KEVON FELMINE

Se­nior Re­porter

kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

For the first time in T&T’s his­to­ry, the three high­est of­fices in the land are held by women.

Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo, Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, and Pen­ne­lope Beck­les-Robin­son now hold the posts of Pres­i­dent, Prime Min­is­ter, and Op­po­si­tion Leader, re­spec­tive­ly. This is a pow­er­ful sym­bol of women’s lead­er­ship—but al­so a mo­ment call­ing for deep re­flec­tion, not just cel­e­bra­tion.

While that fact might be cel­e­brat­ed, ex­perts warn that it is not a sign of true gen­der equal­i­ty.

The ex­ec­u­tive di­rec­tor of the Women’s In­sti­tute for Al­ter­na­tive De­vel­op­ment (WINAD), Fo­lade Mu­to­ta, con­grat­u­lat­ed the trio of lead­ers and ac­knowl­edged the long road women’s rights ad­vo­cates trav­elled to make this day pos­si­ble.

“We have to ap­plaud them and thank them for re­al­ly demon­strat­ing that women can lead and lead ef­fec­tive­ly,” Mu­to­ta said.

She said while their grit and ex­cel­lence are clear, their rise was al­so built on the ef­forts of the women’s move­ment. She cred­it­ed long­stand­ing ad­vo­ca­cy by groups like the Net­work of NGOs for the Ad­vance­ment of Women and lead­ers like Hazel Brown for help­ing carve out these paths to pow­er.

Still, Mu­to­ta cau­tioned against as­sum­ing that the mere pres­ence of women in high of­fice means women’s is­sues in the coun­try have been re­solved.

“We ex­pe­ri­ence gen­der-based vi­o­lence and the lev­el of in­se­cu­ri­ty in our homes con­tin­ues to in­crease. Even our young women walk­ing in the street ex­pe­ri­ence sex­u­al ha­rass­ment” she said.

Mu­to­ta said struc­tur­al in­equal­i­ty per­sists across pub­lic and pri­vate in­sti­tu­tions, so the rise of women to lead­er­ship must not be seen as an end­point.

Rather than cel­e­brate any im­prove­ment in the sta­tus of women be­cause of these el­e­va­tions, she said T&T should take the op­por­tu­ni­ty to re­alise they have at­tained of­fice and ad­vo­cate for more spaces to be women-friend­ly.

She added that while these women in pow­er can shift pol­i­cy­mak­ing norms, it is their choice whether to cen­tre women’s rights. So­ci­ety, she ar­gued, must con­tin­ue to ad­vo­cate so that the full and ef­fec­tive par­tic­i­pa­tion of women be­comes the norm.

“It would be un­fair to leave it to them to make all the de­ci­sions on the ex­tent to which they would ad­vance women’s rights.”

Po­lit­i­cal sci­en­tist Dr In­di­ra Ram­per­sad echoed sim­i­lar sen­ti­ments and de­scribed the mo­ment as “won­der­ful,” say­ing the tide is slow­ly chang­ing in favour of women—but not with­out re­sis­tance.

“You al­ways face that up­hill bat­tle when you’re a woman—some­times bat­tles that men do not have to deal with,” Ram­per­sad said.

“This is a new dy­nam­ic for the PNM, hav­ing an Op­po­si­tion Leader who is a woman.”

She added that women in lead­er­ship roles are held to high­er stan­dards than men and are more fre­quent­ly sub­ject­ed to per­son­al at­tacks.

“When the men are in the same po­si­tion, they do not do any bet­ter. Per­sad-Bisses­sar was called drunk and jamette and all kinds of things,” she re­called. “If a man is called a drunk or if a man is drink­ing, it is no big deal... They al­ways find a way to bring in your sex­u­al­i­ty as a woman in­to some scan­dal or the oth­er.”

Ram­per­sad said the abil­i­ty to en­dure such crit­i­cism—some­times un­fair and deeply gen­dered—is a test of re­solve.

“These lead­ers must be pre­pared for what men will do and get im­mune to it, which takes a lot of guts,” she said.

T&T is not alone in el­e­vat­ing women to the high­est lev­els of lead­er­ship. The Caribbean re­gion has a strong track record with lead­ers like Bar­ba­dos’ Mia Mot­t­ley, Ja­maica’s Por­tia Simp­son Miller, and Dame San­dra Ma­son, who served as Bar­ba­dos’ first pres­i­dent. This re­flects a broad­er shift across the re­gion to­ward recog­nis­ing women’s lead­er­ship.

At home, Ram­per­sad not­ed that women are out­pac­ing men in ed­u­ca­tion and of­ten in lead­er­ship per­for­mance. At the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies where she lec­tures, she sees it first-hand.

“Women are be­com­ing brave. Women are be­com­ing bold, tak­ing up the chal­lenge and the man­tle of lead­er­ship and per­form­ing well,” she said. “Look at the uni­ver­si­ty — the prin­ci­pal is a fe­male, the reg­is­trar is a fe­male, and just be­fore, the bur­sar was a fe­male.”

She con­clud­ed with strong praise for women’s in­tel­lect and emo­tion­al in­sight: “I can tell you the women are much more in­tel­li­gent, are more in­tu­itive… they are more in touch with re­al­i­ty and them­selves.”

Ram­per­sad al­so high­light­ed the re­cent po­lit­i­cal per­for­mance of Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Fe­l­isha Thomas, call­ing her a stand­out speak­er dur­ing the gen­er­al elec­tion cam­paign, which saw the UNC take his­toric PNM strong­holds.

De­spite the sym­bol­ism of three women lead­ing the coun­try, both Mu­to­ta and Ram­per­sad agree: that the re­al work lies ahead.

If this mo­ment is to have a last­ing im­pact, it must move be­yond op­tics and in­to mean­ing­ful change —in pol­i­cy, in so­ci­ety, and in the minds of those who still ques­tion a woman’s place at the top.

Con­grat­u­la­tions for Per­sad-Bisses­sar

WINAD con­grat­u­lat­ed Per­sad-Bisses­sar on her ap­point­ment as Prime Min­is­ter, cel­e­brat­ing the mile­stone for women in lead­er­ship. It com­mend­ed her un­wa­ver­ing ded­i­ca­tion to ad­vanc­ing gen­der equal­i­ty. It said her trail­blaz­ing suc­cess will con­tin­ue to in­spire women as­pir­ing to lead­er­ship across all spheres of pub­lic life.

The Pow­er­ful Ladies of Trinidad and To­ba­go (PLOTT) con­grat­u­lat­ed Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar on Face­book on Tues­day, cel­e­brat­ing her his­toric achieve­ment as the na­tion’s first fe­male Prime Min­is­ter. They pledged sup­port for her ini­tia­tives that pro­mote in­clu­siv­i­ty, up­lift women and girls, and dri­ve na­tion­al progress.