Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has warned that her Gov­ern­ment will not in­crease fund­ing for re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions, say­ing tax­pay­ers’ mon­ey must be used for es­sen­tial ser­vices rather than “fet­ing, rum, win­ing on the road and pay­ing for ghost projects.”

In a so­cial me­dia post yes­ter­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said sev­en Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment-con­trolled cor­po­ra­tions will re­ceive a to­tal of $987.29 mil­lion in 2026, $181.83 mil­lion more than the $805.46 mil­lion al­lo­cat­ed to sev­en Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress-con­trolled cor­po­ra­tions. She not­ed that 13,406 peo­ple are em­ployed across all re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions, with 8,220 in the PNM cor­po­ra­tions and 5,186 in the UNC cor­po­ra­tions.

“Tax­pay­ers are pay­ing 13,406 per­sons in lo­cal gov­ern­ment $2.1 bil­lion; how­ev­er, af­ter 9 am you would be lucky to see the ma­jor­i­ty of them out work­ing,” Per­sad-Bisses­sar said. She con­trast­ed this with teach­ers, health and pro­tec­tive ser­vices, and pri­vate sec­tor work­ers who com­plete hon­est eight-hour shifts.

The Prime Min­is­ter crit­i­cised in­ef­fec­tive work prac­tices, giv­ing the ex­am­ple of “scrap­ing up small mounds of rub­bish and sand for two hours to then leave on the sides of the roads to wash in­to the drains when rain falls.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said her Gov­ern­ment will con­sid­er out­sourc­ing and mech­a­nis­ing tasks cur­rent­ly per­formed by re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions if ser­vices do not im­prove. She al­so point­ed to pre­vi­ous cuts to CEPEP and URP “ghost gangs,” nat­ur­al gas sub­si­dies, and over­priced goods and ser­vices con­tracts to the “con­tract mafia” as mea­sures tak­en to stop the “pick­pock­et­ing of de­cent hard­work­ing law-abid­ing tax­pay­ers.”

The Prime Min­is­ter stressed that fu­ture fund­ing for re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions will de­pend on their per­for­mance over the next eight months, ahead of the next na­tion­al bud­get. She urged em­ploy­ees to “step up or step aside” to en­sure cit­i­zens re­ceive val­ue for their tax­es.

She al­so ap­pealed di­rect­ly to cit­i­zens, say­ing, “De­cent law-abid­ing cit­i­zens must get val­ue for their tax­es they pay from their hard-earned salaries,” em­pha­sis­ing that the ac­count­abil­i­ty of the 13,406 em­ploy­ees will de­ter­mine the fu­ture of the re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions.

Mean­while, the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment has is­sued a call for nom­i­na­tions for the Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tions, al­though the elec­tion has not yet been called by the Prime Min­is­ter.

The par­ty an­nounced the de­ci­sion dur­ing its reg­u­lar month­ly Gen­er­al Coun­cil meet­ing held yes­ter­day at Bal­isi­er House in Port-of-Spain.

Po­lit­i­cal leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les said that fol­low­ing con­sul­ta­tions with mem­bers of the par­ty’s lead­er­ship, the PNM has de­cid­ed to open nom­i­na­tions for lo­cal gov­ern­ment po­si­tions start­ing with seats not held by the par­ty.