JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Saturday, February 15, 2025

Opposition trashes Scotland’s coal pot apology

by

859 days ago
20221009
UNC Senator Anil Roberts, left, addresses members of the media while senator  UNC Senator Damien Lyder listens during the Opposition’s press conference at the Office of the Opposition Leader, Charles Street, Port-of-Spain, yesterday.

UNC Senator Anil Roberts, left, addresses members of the media while senator UNC Senator Damien Lyder listens during the Opposition’s press conference at the Office of the Opposition Leader, Charles Street, Port-of-Spain, yesterday.

UNC FACEBOOK

The coun­try doesn’t want apolo­gies from PNM’s Kei­th Scot­land or ex­pla­na­tions from the Prime Min­is­ter about who’s “on edge”—but peo­ple want a re­ver­sal of the fu­el price hike and the 2023 Bud­get and don’t want to be bur­dened with prop­er­ty tax now, says UNC Sen­a­tor Damien Ly­der.

At Sun­day’s UNC me­dia brief­ing Ly­der and UNC Sen­a­tor Anil Roberts trashed min­is­ters’ state­ments on the bud­get par­tic­u­lar­ly Scot­land’s re­cent apol­o­gy for the “coal pot and bi­cy­cle” rec­om­men­da­tions he made dur­ing the bud­get de­bate.

Ly­der said: “We heard min­is­ters tell you to sac­ri­fice, ride bi­cy­cles, go back to coal pots, stop eat­ing mac­a­roni pies and ham. Some stat­ing there’s no prob­lem with ef­fi­cient bus trans­port and be­rat­ing us as want­i­ng every­thing for noth­ing. This is the lev­el of dis­con­nec­tion from the pub­lic.”

He said Scot­land’s apolo­gies seemed he’d been hum­bled by the peo­ple “and apol­o­gised and was beg­ging”.

But dis­miss­ing Prime Min­is­ter Kei­th Row­ley’s re­cent view that cer­tain state­ments were more like­ly to ir­ri­tate cit­i­zens as “every­body’s on edge”, Ly­der added.

“Cit­i­zens are com­plete­ly over the precipice! The on­ly thing that can res­cue T&T is for this Gov­ern­ment to demit of­fice im­me­di­ate­ly!” Not­ing Gov­ern­ment promised to add com­mer­cial/in­dus­tri­al busi­ness­es to prop­er­ty tax, Ly­der ques­tioned how many years that would take when do­ing the prop­er­ty tax took three years. He felt com­mer­cial/in­dus­tri­al busi­ness­es should be charged the tax since they con­tribute to neigh­bour­hoods’ pol­lu­tion, pot­holes and us­ing garbage ser­vices.

But Ly­der said with T&T’s eco­nom­ic state, this isn’t the cor­rect time for prop­er­ty tax and when UNC re­turns to of­fice soon, would en­sure the tax isn’t im­ple­ment­ed “at this time.” Ly­der al­so called for clear­ing of the air on Cli­co is­sues .

Roberts said: “When you hear Kei­th Scot­land with his wide self, telling you he go ride bike, and he have a coal pot and if you can’t af­ford gas, buy more ex­pen­sive coal– the id­iots that they are!”

“Now they com­ing to feign apol­o­gy?! You (Scot­land) didn’t make the re­mark en pas­sant, you ex­plained what you’ll do and when ...now you com­ing to feign apol­o­gy?! The peo­ple will say fire bun you PNM !”

“Keep your apol­o­gy where it’s best kept—on your bike, in your coal pot and light it with a Three Plumes match!”

Roberts slammed Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter) Min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les’s “ad­vice” on not go­ing to Movi­eTowne three times a week and eat­ing ham and mac­a­roni pie. “He fas and out of place!”

He al­so trashed state­ments by Pres­i­dent Paula Mae Weekes and Min­is­ters Sham­fa Cud­joe, Lisa Mor­ris Julien, Fitzger­ald Hinds, Colm Im­bert and Faris Al- Rawi.

“This is how the PNM is—they were nev­er hum­ble, they’re not here to serve the peo­ple !”

Roberts said PNM min­is­ters were all “Mi­ni Me” clones of Row­ley whom he claimed is “ar­ro­gant heart­less and in­com­pe­tent.”

Roberts crit­i­cised the Na­tion­al Award to CMO Dr Roshan Paras­ram cit­ing COVID deaths—and ques­tioned how this could be “pa­tri­o­tism”.

He added the prop­er­ty tax was op­pres­sive and the PNM “at this time” mustn’t suf­fer the peo­ple.

He said the Per­sad-Bisses­sar gov­ern­ment hadn’t re­moved the fu­el sub­sidy. Roberts said the bud­get had uni­fied peo­ple and brought a tip­ping point.


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored