The month of No­vem­ber of­ten sig­ni­fies prepa­ra­tion for the year’s end, mo­ments of grat­i­tude, and re­flec­tions on ac­com­plish­ments. For Trinidad and To­ba­go, how­ev­er, it was a time marked by eco­nom­ic chal­lenges, tragedy, and crit­i­cal pol­i­cy changes as sev­er­al events cap­tured the coun­try’s at­ten­tion.

One of the promi­nent sto­ries with­in the po­lit­i­cal land­scape in­volved grow­ing ten­sions with­in the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM), par­tic­u­lar­ly in the Laven­tille West con­stituen­cy.

This con­flict emerged dur­ing a PNM Youth League meet­ing aimed at se­lect­ing a pre­ferred can­di­date for the up­com­ing gen­er­al elec­tions.

The meet­ing was dis­rupt­ed by mem­bers of Fitzger­ald Hinds’ con­stituen­cy, in­ten­si­fy­ing ex­ist­ing dis­agree­ments with­in the par­ty. A sim­i­lar sce­nario had un­fold­ed ear­li­er dur­ing the Women’s League meet­ing, where on­ly one in­di­vid­ual ini­tial­ly sup­port­ed Hinds, rais­ing con­cerns about the le­git­i­ma­cy of the gath­er­ing.

These di­vi­sions cul­mi­nat­ed in a tense vote at the Youth League meet­ing, with 18 mem­bers back­ing Hinds and 14 sup­port­ing his ri­val, Ka­reem Mar­celle.

The grow­ing dis­cord al­so un­der­scored the in­ten­si­fy­ing de­bate over lead­er­ship and can­di­date se­lec­tion with­in the par­ty, set­ting the stage for the up­com­ing elec­tions.

Hinds with­draws can­di­da­cy

Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds even­tu­al­ly of­fi­cial­ly with­drew from the race for the Laven­tille West can­di­da­cy. De­spite sup­port from the Laven­tille West Youth League, Hinds de­cid­ed to for­go the nom­i­na­tion process.

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley con­firmed that Hinds had re­scind­ed his con­sent to be nom­i­nat­ed and would not be screened when the PNM pre­sent­ed its nom­i­nees.

Hinds, who has rep­re­sent­ed Laven­tille West since 2015, ini­tial­ly sought nom­i­na­tion in Sep­tem­ber 2024.

Fol­low­ing in­ter­nal par­ty vot­ing, Port-of-Spain al­der­man Mar­celle and Dr Kadelle Jes­samy emerged as the pri­ma­ry con­tenders.

Forex chal­lenges con­tin­ue

The Gov­ern­ment faced in­creas­ing pres­sure re­gard­ing for­eign ex­change man­age­ment. Econ­o­mists, in­clud­ing Dr Vaalmik­ki Ar­joon, and the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty urged Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert to im­ple­ment mea­sures to reg­u­late how banks dis­trib­ute US dol­lars.

This fol­lowed Sco­tia­bank’s de­ci­sion to re­duce US dol­lar spend­ing on cred­it cards, spark­ing a pub­lic back­lash. Dr Ar­joon crit­i­cised banks for hoard­ing for­eign cur­ren­cy to build re­serves rather than cir­cu­lat­ing it, re­strict­ing ac­cess for busi­ness­es and con­sumers.

In re­sponse, the Gov­ern­ment re­sumed the Ex­im­Bank forex win­dow for es­sen­tial im­ports. An­nounced by Fi­nance Min­is­ter Im­bert, the re­vised fa­cil­i­ty, ef­fec­tive No­vem­ber 1, al­lo­cat­ed US$25 mil­lion month­ly—a re­duc­tion from pre­vi­ous COVID-19-era lev­els. The ini­tia­tive aimed to sup­port lo­cal man­u­fac­tur­ing and en­sure busi­ness­es could ac­cess for­eign cur­ren­cy for pro­duc­tion.

The IMF al­so weighed in, stat­ing that T&T’s for­eign ex­change re­stric­tions were in­con­sis­tent with its Ar­ti­cles of Agree­ment. It urged the re­moval of re­stric­tions and greater ex­change rate flex­i­bil­i­ty.

While Fi­nance Min­is­ter Im­bert not­ed that over US$2 bil­lion was in­ject­ed in­to the forex mar­ket in 2023, crit­ics em­pha­sised the need for struc­tur­al changes.

Float­ing the TT dol­lar

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Im­bert again firm­ly re­ject­ed calls to float the Trinidad and To­ba­go dol­lar, warn­ing it would lead to a 30-50 per cent in­crease in food prices, ex­ac­er­bat­ing hard­ships for the poor and mid­dle-class while ben­e­fit­ing a wealthy mi­nor­i­ty.

Speak­ing on Face­book Live, Im­bert high­light­ed the coun­try’s $7.5 bil­lion food im­port bill and ar­gued that de­val­u­a­tion would raise costs with­out cor­re­spond­ing wage in­creas­es, fur­ther strain­ing cit­i­zens.

He crit­i­cised trade unions’ po­ten­tial de­mands for high­er wages to off­set in­fla­tion and con­demned those seek­ing to prof­it from a de­val­ued cur­ren­cy, such as in­di­vid­u­als hold­ing US dol­lar re­serves abroad. Im­bert al­so at­trib­uted in­creased for­eign ex­change (forex) pres­sure to a surge in cred­it card use, blam­ing banks for ag­gres­sive card pro­mo­tions.

Au­to­mo­tive Deal­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Visham Bab­wah raised con­cerns about the black mar­ket for forex, sug­gest­ing the Gov­ern­ment in­ves­ti­gate its op­er­a­tions. He not­ed that com­mer­cial car deal­ers of­ten re­sort to this mar­ket due to lim­it­ed of­fi­cial forex ac­cess.

Sep­a­rate­ly, Im­bert an­nounced plans to run for one more term in the next gen­er­al elec­tion, de­scrib­ing it as his “last lap,” and say­ing he re­mains in good health and ca­pa­ble of serv­ing.

Back­lash over SRC salary hike rec­om­mends

The Gov­ern­ment ac­cept­ed a Salaries Re­view Com­mis­sion (SRC) pro­pos­al for salary in­creas­es for a range of high-rank­ing state of­fi­cials, in­clud­ing a raise for the Prime Min­is­ter from $59,680 to $87,847.

Prime Min­is­ter Row­ley de­fend­ed the de­ci­sion, ac­knowl­edg­ing dis­sent but em­pha­sis­ing the jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for the in­creas­es af­ter 13 years of stag­nant salaries. The de­ci­sion, how­ev­er, sparked de­bate on fair­ness and po­lit­i­cal trans­paren­cy as the coun­try ap­proached gen­er­al elec­tions.

Po­lice of­fi­cers fac­ing court

The T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) re-laid charges against sev­en of­fi­cers pre­vi­ous­ly dis­missed in a case in­volv­ing al­leged ex­tor­tion of busi­ness­es in San­gre Grande.

Act­ing on ad­vice from the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP), the charges were rein­tro­duced. The of­fi­cers were ini­tial­ly charged af­ter a vi­ral video showed a group of of­fi­cers al­leged­ly seiz­ing cash from a busi­ness.

Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher reaf­firmed the TTPS’s com­mit­ment to jus­tice, though the ju­di­cial re­view on the le­gal­i­ty of re-lay­ing charges con­tin­ues.

Mi­grant con­tro­ver­sy

Dur­ing a Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) con­sul­ta­tion on crim­i­nal jus­tice re­form, Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar ad­dressed the is­sue of il­le­gal Venezue­lan mi­grants, warn­ing of de­por­ta­tion for those en­gag­ing in crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ties if her par­ty is re­turned to pow­er.

Her re­marks sparked con­tro­ver­sy, with Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds ac­cus­ing her of di­vi­sive rhetoric, liken­ing her ap­proach to then-for­mer US pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump’s. Hinds dis­missed her state­ments as po­lit­i­cal­ly mo­ti­vat­ed rather than a gen­uine so­lu­tion to the mi­grant cri­sis.

Flood­ing cri­sis

Se­vere flood­ing hit Diego Mar­tin, Pe­tit Val­ley, and Wood­land fol­low­ing heavy rains. Homes and busi­ness­es were in­un­dat­ed by flood­wa­ters, and res­i­dents ex­pressed frus­tra­tion over poor in­fra­struc­ture and in­ad­e­quate gov­ern­ment re­sponse.

Diego Mar­tin MP Symon de No­bri­ga as­sured that re­sources were be­ing de­ployed in his con­stituen­cy, but many res­i­dents crit­i­cised the slow pace of re­lief ef­forts. Im­prop­er drainage main­te­nance and un­reg­u­lat­ed de­vel­op­ment were blamed for wors­en­ing the flood­ing.

Tragedy hits Mathu­ra fam­i­ly again

A high-pro­file case in­volv­ing the Mathu­ra fam­i­ly took a trag­ic turn when Alana Mathu­ra, who was on re­mand af­ter be­ing charged along­side her hus­band with the mur­der of her daugh­ter Han­nah, passed away in cus­tody af­ter re­fus­ing to eat.

Her death, 17 days af­ter in­car­cer­a­tion, raised ques­tions about prison con­di­tions. Al­le­ga­tions of rape dur­ing her im­pris­on­ment were de­nied by the Com­mis­sion­er of Pris­ons Car­los Cor­raspe.

Port protests

Protests at the Port of Port-of-Spain in­ten­si­fied, with the Sea­men and Wa­ter­front Work­ers’ Trade Union (SWW­TU) de­mand­ing a 12 per cent wage in­crease. Work­ers staged “sick-out” ac­tions, dis­rupt­ing op­er­a­tions and de­lay­ing con­tain­er ship­ments ahead of the Christ­mas sea­son.

Busi­ness groups raised con­cerns over the eco­nom­ic im­pact, as de­lays threat­ened raw ma­te­r­i­al sup­plies and pro­duc­tion sched­ules. Talks with the Gov­ern­ment con­tin­ued, but ten­sions re­mained high as unions re­sist­ed pro­pos­als per­ceived as in­ad­e­quate.

The in­dus­tri­al ac­tion, then im­pact­ing crit­i­cal sec­tors, re­volved around a 12 per cent wage in­crease for 2014-2019 and un­re­solved health and safe­ty con­cerns for near­ly 1,500 dock­work­ers. On the 12 per cent wage in­crease, the union claimed it was agreed up­on but not even­tu­al­ly sanc­tioned by the Chief Per­son­nel Of­fi­cer (CPO). The Gov­ern­ment coun­tered with a four per cent of­fer, lat­er con­sid­er­ing a five per cent pro­pos­al for 2020–2022.

Ef­forts by four lead­ing busi­ness cham­bers to re­solve the on­go­ing port work­ers’ dis­pute sparked crit­i­cism from the Na­tion­al Trade Union Cen­tre (NATUC) and the SWW­TU, po­ten­tial­ly es­ca­lat­ing ten­sions. NATUC con­demned the cham­bers—Am­cham T&T, the En­er­gy Cham­ber, the T&T Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce, and the T&T Man­u­fac­tur­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion—for pri­ori­tis­ing com­mer­cial in­ter­ests over dock­work­ers’ rights. SWW­TU pres­i­dent Michael Anisette ar­gued the cham­bers’ state­ment un­der­mined work­ers and could wors­en the con­flict.

While the cham­bers called for swift Gov­ern­ment in­ter­ven­tion, Anisette claimed the Labour Min­istry’s de­layed in­quiry in­to the dis­pute high­light­ed a lack of aware­ness or en­gage­ment.

Am­cham T&T CEO Ni­rad Tewarie de­fend­ed the cham­bers, em­pha­sis­ing their in­tent to en­cour­age res­o­lu­tion for the ben­e­fit of all par­ties, in­clud­ing con­sumers and work­ers. Fol­low­ing the cham­bers’ state­ment, the Labour Min­istry con­tact­ed both the SWW­TU and Port Au­thor­i­ty to doc­u­ment is­sues, but Anisette ex­pressed scep­ti­cism about the min­istry’s pre­pared­ness.

Trade and In­dus­try Min­is­ter Paula Gopee-Scoon as­sured the “whole-of-gov­ern­ment ap­proach” to re­solve the im­passe, but con­cerns per­sist­ed over po­ten­tial dis­rup­tions dur­ing the forth­com­ing Christ­mas sea­son.

PATT gets in­junc­tion

Port work­ers were or­dered to re­sume work fol­low­ing an In­dus­tri­al Court in­junc­tion, a de­ci­sion hailed by the Port Au­thor­i­ty and Works and Trans­port Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan as a “vic­to­ry for Trinidad and To­ba­go.” The rul­ing came af­ter over a month of in­dus­tri­al ac­tion by the SWW­TU which dis­rupt­ed busi­ness­es and crit­i­cal sec­tors of the econ­o­my due to de­lays at the port.

The court hear­ing, presided over by In­dus­tri­al Court pres­i­dent Heather Seale and oth­er key mem­bers, marked a crit­i­cal turn­ing point. An­nisette crit­i­cised the Port Au­thor­i­ty for opt­ing for le­gal ac­tion in­stead of di­a­logue but agreed to com­ply with the court’s de­ci­sion, pend­ing fur­ther hear­ings on De­cem­ber 6.

Talks be­tween Min­is­ter Sinanan and Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert are on­go­ing to re­solve the wage dis­pute.

Labour un­rest

Labour ten­sions es­ca­lat­ed na­tion­wide as the Joint Trade Union Move­ment or­gan­ised mass protests against ris­ing prices, blocked wage in­creas­es, and job cuts. Pub­lic frus­tra­tion mount­ed over pay dis­par­i­ties, par­tic­u­lar­ly in light of the SRC’s salary ad­just­ments for top high-rank­ing state of­fi­cials.

No­vem­ber 2024 was a tur­bu­lent month for Trinidad and To­ba­go, re­flect­ing the na­tion’s strug­gles with po­lit­i­cal di­vi­sion, eco­nom­ic chal­lenges, and nat­ur­al dis­as­ters while high­light­ing some ef­forts to­wards res­o­lu­tion and progress.