Econ­o­mist Dr In­dera Sage­wan says changes to state boards fol­low­ing a change in gov­ern­ment are nor­mal, but new ap­pointees must pos­sess the skills and ex­pe­ri­ence nec­es­sary to lead in­sti­tu­tions ef­fec­tive­ly.

Sage­wan, who is serv­ing on the Cen­tral Bank’s board of di­rec­tors for a three-year term end­ing in No­vem­ber 2028, made the com­ments on CNC3’s The Morn­ing Brew yes­ter­day, amid a se­ries of lead­er­ship changes at state-owned com­pa­nies and agen­cies, in­clud­ing re­cent de­vel­op­ments at Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um, where chair­man Kurt Ram­lal re­signed.

Sage­wan said boards play a crit­i­cal role in the di­rec­tion of state in­sti­tu­tions.

“The board of di­rec­tors of any in­sti­tu­tion shapes its pol­i­cy di­rec­tion based on where the gov­ern­ment wants to take it,” she said.

Ac­cord­ing to Sage­wan, board changes fol­low­ing a change in gov­ern­ment have be­come an ac­cept­ed prac­tice in Trinidad and To­ba­go be­cause in­com­ing ad­min­is­tra­tions typ­i­cal­ly seek di­rec­tors who align with their pol­i­cy ob­jec­tives.

“It is par for the course in our coun­try that when a gov­ern­ment changes, the board changes as well, be­cause a gov­ern­ment wants to en­sure it has peo­ple on the board of di­rec­tors who are aligned with its poli­cies and its vi­sion for the coun­try,” she said.

How­ev­er, she stressed that the process should be sub­ject to pub­lic scruti­ny to en­sure po­lit­i­cal con­sid­er­a­tions do not come at the ex­pense of com­pe­tence.

“I would be wor­ried if, for ex­am­ple, the changes did not re­flect the lev­el of ex­per­tise and skill sets we want to see as­so­ci­at­ed with the or­gan­i­sa­tion, both at the board lev­el and with­in man­age­ment,” Sage­wan said.

Sage­wan said the pub­lic should re­main vig­i­lant and crit­i­cal of ap­point­ments while al­low­ing the process to un­fold.

“We have to trust the process to some ex­tent, but we should al­so re­main mind­ful and crit­i­cal. We should not be afraid to ques­tion the process,” she said.

Us­ing First Cit­i­zens Bank as an ex­am­ple, she said the ap­point­ment of its for­mer chief ex­ec­u­tive to an­oth­er role should not au­to­mat­i­cal­ly be viewed as po­lit­i­cal in­ter­fer­ence, giv­en his long-stand­ing as­so­ci­a­tion with the in­sti­tu­tion.

“It was a de­ci­sion that this in­di­vid­ual took be­cause he be­lieved bet­ter and broad­er op­por­tu­ni­ties were be­ing af­ford­ed to him,” she said.

Sage­wan main­tained that con­cerns should arise on­ly when ap­point­ments fail to re­flect the qual­i­fi­ca­tions and ex­pe­ri­ence re­quired for a po­si­tion.

“We have not yet seen a re­place­ment, but if, for ex­am­ple, FCB were to ap­point its jan­i­tor as the next CEO, that would be cause for con­cern. How­ev­er, if the per­son ap­point­ed has the req­ui­site skills, ex­pe­ri­ence and qual­i­fi­ca­tions, then that is sim­ply part of the process,” she said.