Chief Secretary Farley Augustine has given his leadership a passing grade.
Reflecting on his administration’s performance as they marked three years in office yesterday, Augustine said his team did well.
“If we are to rate the government’s (Tobago House of Assembly) performance, we are somewhere at a seven out of ten but being the kind of perfectionist I am, I want to push in this last year to get it closer to ten,” Augustine said while speaking to Guardian Media at the Chief Secretary’s Tobago Secondary Schools’ Art Competition pawards ceremony at the Lowlands Multipurpose Facility in Lowlands.
“Transformational leadership requires that you have to do some messy work and a lot of messy cleaning up, and I’m happy that we have been able to get that done.”
He said his administration had outperformed the previous People’s National Movement regime and is focused on positioning Tobago as a leading island globally, not just regionally.
He spoke of challenges but mentioned his successes, including stabilising Tobago’s economy post-COVID, improving salaries, increasing social grants, and boosting agricultural and health services.
“We have demonstrated an ability to remain stable, even in the presence of what might appear to be chaos… I feel like we have a very stable government that was able to stabilise the Tobago economy post-COVID,” he said.
“We have given up more lands in under three years than the previous regime has given out in the whole 21 years… we have far less complaints than we used to have in the past in the healthcare system.”
While proud of the progress, he said his team must push harder in the coming year to achieve more for Tobagonians.
On December 6, 2021—in an election to break the 6-6 deadlock created in the THA election earlier that year—the Progressive Democratic Patriots (PDP) achieved a landslide victory, winning 14 out of 15 seats and ending a two-decade reign by the PNM.
Augustine became Chief Secretary. However, in late 2022, a major shift happened when Augustine and 12 other PDP members left the party, following a public spat between political leader Watson Duke and Augustine.
They initially governed as independents before forming the Tobago People’s Party (TPP) in 2023.
Just last week, Augustine, the TPP leader, announced that the process for screening potential candidates for the Tobago East and West seats had started.
The one-year-old party held its first internal election in June, to form an executive.
Recently, political analysts Dr Bishnu Ragoonath and Dr Indira Rampersad said they feel the TPP has the potential to make a strong impact on Tobago’s electorate in the upcoming general election and even become kingmakers once their strategy is solid.
Asked about this, Augustine said he believes his party is strategically placed to secure what Tobago needs from the Government.
“I’m an excellent chess player. While some people in the political space operate in the world of checkers, I play chess,” he said.
Augustine explained that the TPP’s strategy is part of a divine plan.
“This is a case of God’s design and God’s inspiration for the strategy.”
However, he said the TPP isn’t interested in becoming “kingmakers” but in ensuring Tobago has the power to negotiate for its future.
“Our two Tobago seats have to be used strategically to ensure Tobago gets what it wants out of this autonomy conversation,” Augustine said.
He criticised the current Tobago representatives, Shamfa Cudjoe-Lewis and Ayanna Webster-Roy, calling them “useless” and likening them to “cheap China your grandparents used to buy and put in the cabinet, only used at Christmas and looking nice but useless.”
Augustine explained that with the two Tobago seats, Tobago would been in a much stronger position.
“If we withdraw those two seats and take them back and keep them for ourselves, it means that when budget comes up…we have two people who could actually negotiate,” he said.
He said Tobagonians are smart and know “for anything (in Parliament) to pass, for policies to get through, you need the two Tobago votes in the Parliament.”
