Shas­tri Boodan

Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo ORTT has chal­lenged mem­bers of the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty to of­fer them­selves to serve on a wide range of Boards, Com­mis­sions and Tri­bunals.

She was at the time de­liv­er­ing the fea­ture ad­dress at the Cou­va/Point Lisas Cham­ber of Com­merce’s (CPLCC ) An­nu­al Christ­mas Din­ner and Awards Cer­e­mo­ny on Wednes­day at the CPLCC Ad­min­is­tra­tive Com­plex at Cam­den Road, Cou­va.

She said, “Serv­ing in these ca­pac­i­ties is very much a means of serv­ing the wider so­ci­ety and at this junc­ture in our coun­try’s de­vel­op­ment, I be­lieve that it is a crit­i­cal­ly im­por­tant means of na­tion­al ser­vice.”

The Pres­i­dent said there are chal­lenges when one makes the de­ci­sion to serve, “Those who do so ex­pose them­selves to the risk of be­ing crit­i­cised, of­ten un­fair­ly, by the very pub­lic whom they serve.

As mem­bers of that very pub­lic, we might some­times seem to such per­sons, like un­grate­ful chil­dren in this re­gard. But, like good par­ents do, per­sons who an­swer this par­tic­u­lar call to serve the greater good, bear it all with love and with pa­tience.”

Her Ex­cel­len­cy said ser­vice may re­sult in one hav­ing to avoid en­gag­ing in oth­er ac­tiv­i­ties in or­der to pre­serve the ap­pear­ance of im­par­tial­i­ty.