ELIZ­A­BETH GON­ZA­LES

GML Cor­re­spon­dent

PNM To­ba­go leader An­cil Den­nis has promised that To­bag­o­ni­ans will be in­formed in ad­vance of over­seas trav­el by To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly sec­re­taries and that of­fi­cials will be re­quired to ac­count to the pub­lic on their re­turn.

The com­mit­ment comes amid pub­lic con­cern about over­seas trav­el by THA sec­re­taries over the past four years.

Den­nis made the pledge on Sun­day night at the Mag­dale­na Grand Beach and Golf Re­sort, dur­ing the launch of the PNM’s Big, Bold and Red plans.

“There will nev­er be a sit­u­a­tion where any Sec­re­tary is out of the coun­try joyrid­ing and you, the peo­ple of To­ba­go, were not in­formed,” Den­nis said.

He said that un­der a PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion, ad­vance dis­clo­sure of of­fi­cial trav­el would be manda­to­ry.

“When they leave here, they will leave with your knowl­edge and with your per­mis­sion,” he told sup­port­ers.

Den­nis said ac­count­abil­i­ty would al­so ap­ply af­ter of­fi­cials re­turn to To­ba­go.

“When they re­turn, they will be re­quired to re­port to you, the peo­ple of To­ba­go, on what they went to do and how suc­cess­ful they were in that mis­sion,” he said.

His com­ments fol­low pub­lic ques­tions about over­seas trips tak­en un­der the cur­rent THA ad­min­is­tra­tion led by Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine, in­clud­ing con­cerns about ad­vance no­tice and re­port­ing af­ter of­fi­cials re­turned.