Da­reece Po­lo

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath has bro­ken weeks of si­lence over the con­tro­ver­sial Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Ser­vices of Trinidad and To­ba­go (TSTT) ex­ec­u­tive re­treat, dis­put­ing claims that it cost the State more than $400,000.

While re­ject­ing the fig­ure as in­flat­ed, he ac­knowl­edged rep­ri­mand­ing the board over the mat­ter.

Padarath was speak­ing at the launch of de­silt­ing works in El So­cor­ro yes­ter­day, where he ad­dressed the is­sue for the first time af­ter re­peat­ed at­tempts to ob­tain a com­ment fol­low­ing the ini­tial March 8 re­port.

The Min­is­ter ex­plained that the re­treat cost was clos­er to $165,000, ex­clud­ing VAT, main­tain­ing that he had cau­tioned the board on the need for fi­nan­cial pru­dence. The sum would amount to $185,625 if a 12.5 per cent VAT is ap­plied.

“I chose not to speak un­til I saw the in­voic­es for my­self. Be­cause I asked to see the in­voic­es my­self. This re­treat mat­ter was not dis­cussed with me pri­or to the board go­ing on­to the re­treat. There was no con­sul­ta­tion with the Min­is­ter, so I was not aware that they were go­ing on a re­treat. How­ev­er, sub­se­quent to that, when the mat­ter was brought to my at­ten­tion, I asked to see the in­voic­es. The in­voic­es are in the sum of $165,000 vat ex­clu­sive.”

“The point is that the coun­try is at a fi­nan­cial cross­road. Cit­i­zens ex­pect more, and there­fore, I have told TSTT cit­i­zens ex­pect bet­ter of you, whether it is $1 or whether it is $5 mil­lion spent.”

Ear­li­er this month, Guardian Me­dia ex­clu­sive­ly re­port­ed that TSTT was in­voiced $436,081.78 for the re­treat, based on doc­u­ments ob­tained, at a time when the com­pa­ny post­ed an $82.2 mil­lion loss in its fi­nan­cial state­ments for the year end­ed March 31, 2025.

Tak­ing is­sue with the re­port, Padarath ac­cused Guardian Me­dia of “sen­sa­tion­al­ism”, claim­ing the or­gan­i­sa­tion re­fused to pro­vide the in­voic­es it ob­tained so TSTT could ver­i­fy the re­port­ed fig­ure be­fore pub­li­ca­tion.

Padarath added that pre­vi­ous boards had trav­elled to New York and Lon­don for re­treats cost­ing the State mil­lions.

How­ev­er, the Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Work­ers Union has re­ject­ed the Min­is­ter’s re­vised fig­ures, al­leg­ing that the in­voic­es were al­tered.

De­spite this, Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al Joanne Ogeer main­tains that even a re­duced cost of $165,000 re­mains ex­ces­sive and is call­ing for ac­count­abil­i­ty at TSTT over the de­ci­sion to pro­ceed with­out min­is­te­r­i­al over­sight.

“We are say­ing re­spon­si­bil­i­ty with­out ac­count­abil­i­ty is fu­tile. So, Mr Min­is­ter, now that you have found out that it is $165,000, which the union can say, and we will say with­out a fear of be­ing con­tra­dict­ed, that the in­voice was re­vised. We know that for a fact... How are you go­ing to treat with this? Is it go­ing to be some­one go­ing on ad­min­is­tra­tive leave, be­ing placed on ad­min­is­tra­tive leave, or is it some­body is go­ing to get their pink slip?”

“Lisa Agard and Shi­va Ram­nar­ine, they were both dis­missed from the com­pa­ny for less than this.”

Ogeer al­so crit­i­cised the Min­is­ter’s three-week de­lay in re­spond­ing to the re­port, de­scrib­ing it as “very iron­ic and con­ve­nient”, and said his find­ings should be made pub­lic.

Sim­i­lar con­cerns were raised by for­mer pub­lic util­i­ties min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les.

“Giv­en his pen­chant for lies, he must show the doc­u­men­ta­tion to prove what he is say­ing,” he said.

Gon­za­les added that Padarath bears full re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for the ac­tions of his min­istry and can­not dis­tance him­self from a board he ap­point­ed.

“He ap­point­ed this board, and he can­not sep­a­rate him­self from them when it is con­ve­nient to him. He doesn’t en­joy that priv­i­lege. The TSTT board was sim­ply tak­ing its cue from its line Min­is­ter by giv­ing ‘per­for­mance’.”

More­over, Gon­za­les called on the min­is­ter to pro­vide ev­i­dence sup­port­ing his claims that pre­vi­ous boards held re­treats in Lon­don and New York at sig­nif­i­cant cost to the State.