Prime Minister Stuart Young has finally broken his silence on a bullying incident involving him which occurred some 33 years ago while he was a student at St Mary’s College in Port-of-Spain.
Young has been accused by the relatives of one of his former schoolmates of being a bully, which led to the schoolboy attacking him with a baton in retaliation.
The incident was highlighted in a social post hours after Young was inaugurated as Prime Minister last week and has since gone viral, sparking widespread national debate on the issue.
In response, Young also took to social media yesterday to address the matter for the first time, saying bullying in this country was a matter that could not be overlooked.
He said, “The issue of bullying in this country is unfortunately real and one that I take very seriously as a father and now as Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago.”
In a reference to the incident, he said, “It is deeply unfortunate that an incident which occurred when I was a teenaged schoolboy has resurfaced in a way that does not allow for a full and fair discussion. This incident was traumatic for everyone involved.”
He added, “People are shaped by their experiences and I have no intention of minimising anyone’s feelings, even my own, on this matter, some 33 years later. The public’s interest is not served by politicising an issue as sensitive as bullying, which deserves thoughtful discussion and meaningful solutions.”
Young also committed to ensuring schools are safe spaces for all children.
“Let’s focus on writing the next chapter in which we work to ensure that our schools are safe spaces where all children can feel protected and get the support that is needed. That is my commitment to Trinidad and Tobago.”
However, Opposition Member of Parliament for Princes Town, Barry Padarath, is calling on Young to apologise, as he reminded that he too has a firsthand experience of being bullied by the now Prime Minister.
Padarath told Guardian Media, “My advice to the Prime Minister would be to take ownership, apologise. But, essentially an apology would not really suffice.
“What people want to see in this country is a greater degree of leadership through example, and the Prime Minister has shown over the past couple of weeks and months, that he has not deviated from that behaviour. He has not learnt from the mistakes of the past.”
He added, “It was Imran Khan in 1990s. Tomorrow, sitting in the Office of the Prime Minister, it could be any public servant. It can be any Member of Parliament. We saw it with the Leader of the Opposition. It could be your child in the national school system. Therefore, it is a serious and worrying situation to see that this information has come into the public space and the Prime Minister is attempting to trivialise the matter and not take ownership and accept responsibility for what has occurred.
“While I understand that there may be those putting forward the argument that it occurred 30 years ago, we have to see whether or not that pattern of behaviour still exists. Whether or not there are deep-rooted psychological issues that the prime minister may have experienced in his own childhood.”
Padarath claimed he’s witnessed Young many times during parliamentary sessions, so much so that both he and Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar have asked Government Ministers to talk to their colleague about his behaviour.
Guardian Media also spoke to two psychologists who agreed with Young that even 33 years later, bullying incidents can be traumatic.
Clinical psychologist and president-elect of the Trinidad and Tobago Association of Psychologists, Victoria Siewnarine-Geelalsingh, said not only can it still affect victims but added that oftentimes, bullies were initially victims of bullying.
Siewnarine-Geelalsingh said, “Of course, the thing about trauma is a lot of times if it is unresolved, then it sits in our unconscious minds and things that sit in our unconscious minds actually motivates our decisions, our behaviours without us even knowing it... The act of bullying is where someone displays repeated actions towards and causing another person to be lower than them in an exercise of power. A person doesn’t wake up one morning and decide they’re going to hurt other people. It has to come from somewhere.
“Oftentimes, the act of bullying itself is an overcompensation for an individual who is a victim and who already feels as though they don’t have a sense of power in their environment, or who feels as though they are bullied themselves in their own environment. So, the person who starts off this process of being a bully is already a victim before they bully someone else.”
When it comes to accountability, Siewnarine-Geelalsingh said Young should take responsibility, since he was one of the persons involved in the incident.
“The fact that now we have someone in a leadership position who might have done acts as these, one of the things we would want to see and one of the things that would be helpful is to take responsibility for whatever part of the scenario was, in fact, his to be taken. As we said, it was an alleged incident, we’re not quite sure. Only the persons involved would know. But, there is a sense of responsibility that would be his.”
Meanwhile, clinical and educational psychologist Dr Margaret Nakhid-Chatoor believes that although the incident has resurfaced over three decades later, it is good the conversation on bullying is taking place.
Nakhid-Chatoor said, “I think if a parliamentarian has decided to address an issue that negatively impacted him, I think that is a positive and it could only bode well, especially for the children of our nation who would say he is ready to talk about it. He’s talking about it. It happened to him. What is his context and then they could be very reflective and then therefore look at their own.”
Guardian Media also reached out to political scientist Dr Hamid Ghany to find out whether he believed this incident could affect Young’s chances at the polls on April 28th. However, Ghany said any assessment of this would be speculative and there needs to be polling data to measure that.
