Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) Sen­a­tor An­cil Den­nis says there’s no need for a gen­er­al coun­cil to rat­i­fy the de­ci­sion to name En­er­gy Min­is­ter Stu­art Young as the next prime min­is­ter.

He al­so be­lieves peo­ple are con­fus­ing the roles of po­lit­i­cal leader and prime min­is­ter, which are gov­erned by two sep­a­rate process­es.

Den­nis ex­plained that Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley’s an­nounce­ment of his in­ten­tion to step down trig­gered a con­sti­tu­tion­al process, which he said was strict­ly fol­lowed. He said this process is en­tire­ly sep­a­rate from se­lect­ing a po­lit­i­cal leader for the par­ty. He clar­i­fied that the par­ty’s con­sti­tu­tion gov­erns how a po­lit­i­cal leader is elect­ed, while the coun­try’s Con­sti­tu­tion de­ter­mines the ap­point­ment of a Prime Min­is­ter.

And as of now, the po­si­tion of po­lit­i­cal leader is oc­cu­pied by Row­ley and will be tend­ed to when a va­can­cy aris­es, Den­nis said.

“We cur­rent­ly do not have a va­can­cy (for po­lit­i­cal leader), and when­ev­er that va­can­cy aris­es, the par­ty will treat with that in ac­cor­dance with the par­ty’s con­sti­tu­tion," he said.

He said, to be clear, “po­lit­i­cal leader is about the par­ty and the par­ty’s con­sti­tu­tion, the Of­fice of Prime Min­is­ter is de­ter­mined by the coun­try’s Con­sti­tu­tion, which has been fol­lowed in this process. So let me just say as well, that I do not agree that there is any need for any gen­er­al coun­cil rat­i­fi­ca­tion or any con­ven­tion rat­i­fi­ca­tion for the Of­fice of Prime Min­is­ter. It is to­tal­ly dif­fer­ent.”

He says the process to se­lect a new prime min­is­ter has been clear and con­sti­tu­tion­al, and he hopes peo­ple un­der­stand the dif­fer­ence be­tween choos­ing a po­lit­i­cal leader and ap­point­ing a prime min­is­ter.

He steered away from com­ment­ing on the ru­mours of an in­ter­nal riff fol­low­ing Young’s se­lec­tion.

Mean­while, Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) Po­lit­i­cal leader Wat­son Duke has warned Row­ley to learn from his past mis­takes af­ter nam­ing Young as his suc­ces­sor. He warned Row­ley that hand­ing over pow­er doesn’t al­ways go as planned.

In a so­cial me­dia video yes­ter­day, Duke re­mind­ed Row­ley of his feel­ing of be­tray­al af­ter hand­ing over lead­er­ship of the Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion (PSA) in 2021 to Leroy Bap­tiste.

“I Wat­son Solomon Duke took God out of my thoughts. Think that I could trust mankind, and I trust the cur­rent leader of the PSA (Leroy Bap­tiste) with of­fice in 2021, De­cem­ber. I was be­trayed. Be­trayed. Have to now turn around and fight for my sur­vival.”

He said he al­so still lives in re­gret over his de­ci­sion to sup­port Far­ley Au­gus­tine as To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) Chief Sec­re­tary.

“I al­so did the same thing in the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly where I said, Far­ley, you go ahead. I put God out of my thoughts. Big mis­take, big mis­take. I live to re­gret it to this day, to this day.”

Fol­low­ing a pub­lic spat be­tween Au­gus­tine and Duke less than a year af­ter the Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) won the elec­tion, Duke left the THA Ex­ec­u­tive Coun­cil. Au­gus­tine and the THA as­sem­bly­men then re­signed from the PDP and formed the To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty.

Duke told Row­ley that Young might not take his guid­ance once he be­comes prime min­is­ter. He warned Row­ley that once some­one gains pow­er, they of­ten stop lis­ten­ing to ad­vice.

Duke al­so ques­tioned whether Young could con­nect with the Afro-Trin­bag­on­ian pop­u­la­tion. He said Young might not un­der­stand the chal­lenges of or­di­nary peo­ple be­cause of his priv­i­leged back­ground.

“He may not know what hunger is like. He may not know what go­ing to the Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal is like. He may not know what not hav­ing mon­ey to buy med­ica­tion is like.”

Duke sug­gest­ed the elec­tion be called when the prime min­is­ter demits of­fice af­ter Car­ni­val, al­low­ing the coun­try to vote for its next leader.

He said elec­tions would let the peo­ple de­cide who they want to lead, rather than hav­ing a new prime min­is­ter cho­sen with­out their in­put.

“Let the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go choose their prime min­is­ter. Let them hear his pre­sen­ta­tions, the ar­gu­ments, let them see his team, and let them choose their prime min­is­ter.”

Mean­while, Deputy Chief Sec­re­tary Faith Breb­nor (for­mer­ly B.Yis­rael) said the on­go­ing is­sues in Cen­tral Gov­ern­ment are not the same as the 2022 fall­out be­tween Au­gus­tine and Duke in the THA.

Speak­ing on a morn­ing TV pro­gramme yes­ter­day, she said, “Even though that hap­pened in the po­lit­i­cal sphere, we did not al­low that to in­ter­fere with the gov­er­nance of the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly. We showed a spe­cif­ic kind of dis­ci­pline and lead­er­ship, en­sur­ing that what was hap­pen­ing on the po­lit­i­cal front did not in­ter­fere with the run­ning of the THA. By no means do I think it’s the same thing at all.”

She said she is wor­ried the ru­moured in­ter­nal po­lit­i­cal con­flict could harm the coun­try if left unchecked.