JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Monday, March 17, 2025

UNC waits on Imbert to decide next move on Procurement Act

by

Rhondor Dowlat
615 days ago
20230711
  UNC candidate Imran Khan, right, and NTA Coordinator-East Insaf Enightoola exchanged party T-shirts   during the walkabout yesteraday afternoon as NTA political leader Gary Griffith right, and MP Saddam Hosein, left, look on.

UNC candidate Imran Khan, right, and NTA Coordinator-East Insaf Enightoola exchanged party T-shirts during the walkabout yesteraday afternoon as NTA political leader Gary Griffith right, and MP Saddam Hosein, left, look on.

VASHTI SINGH

Se­nior Re­porter

rhon­dor.dowlat@guardian.co.tt

The Op­po­si­tion Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) will wait un­til to­day to de­cide if to go ahead with le­gal ac­tion re­gard­ing the amend­ment of the Pro­cure­ment Act.

The UNC, which is cur­rent­ly con­tem­plat­ing pe­ti­tion­ing the court, said it will be hold­ing its hand to hear if the mat­ter will be ad­dressed by Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert to­day at a press brief­ing to be held at 9 am.

Im­bert has called a me­dia con­fer­ence to dis­cuss fi­nance-re­lat­ed mat­ters.

On Sun­day, MP Sad­dam Ho­sein called out Im­bert for an ex­pla­na­tion on a three-month Or­der which ex­empts from the pro­cure­ment law, the pro­vi­sion of ser­vices for events as­so­ci­at­ed with vis­its by for­eign dig­ni­taries—and which Ho­sein claims is il­le­gal since it lacks Par­lia­men­tary ap­proval.

Speak­ing with the Guardian Me­dia dur­ing a joint walk­a­bout in the Barataria area yes­ter­day with the Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA), Barataria/San Juan MP Ho­sein said, “We are wait­ing on Min­is­ter Im­bert to re­al­ly give us an an­swer as to why he didn’t come to Par­lia­ment for that Or­der to be ap­proved where he has to­tal­ly ex­empt­ed all ex­pen­di­ture for that Cari­com Sum­mit.

“We would have re­mem­bered the two-day Crime Sym­po­sium to tell every­body that crime is not the PNM prob­lem, it’s that it is a health emer­gency and that cost us the tax­pay­ers $3.4 mil­lion.”

Ho­sein added, “This was a five-day Sum­mit and it might cross five, six, sev­en, eight mil­lion, ten mil­lion, 20 mil­lion, we don’t know, but Im­bert needs to come and give us the an­swers now. That Or­der that he pub­lished on the 29th of June is ab­solute­ly il­le­gal.”

He ex­plained that the law is very clear.

“Min­is­ter Im­bert, if he want­ed to ex­empt those ser­vices from the Pro­cure­ment Act he had to come to the Par­lia­ment. I see that he has a press con­fer­ence to­mor­row (Tues­day), so I await to hear what Min­is­ter Im­bert has to say about this is­sue.

“He will be dis­re­spect­ing the Par­lia­ment and he will be dis­re­spect­ing the peo­ple of T&T if he fails to ad­dress this is­sue be­cause this is not the Bal­isi­er fund that they’re spend­ing. This is the Trea­sury that be­longs to the peo­ple of T&T,” Ho­sein said.

“If we have to go to court on this mat­ter, we have very good lawyers in the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress and we will take this Gov­ern­ment to court. We have to re­mem­ber that the on­ly rea­son why we have a Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tions is be­cause we had to go to the Privy Coun­cil, knock on their doors for the peo­ple to have their right to vote in this elec­tion.”

Po­lit­i­cal Leader of the Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance, Gary Grif­fith, who was on the walk­a­bout with Ho­sein and the UNC’s Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tions can­di­dates al­so shared his views say­ing the Gov­ern­ment does not look good in the court of pub­lic opin­ion.

“The coun­try, they’re see­ing the hypocrisy, the dou­ble stan­dard. The coun­try needs to re­mem­ber $45 mil­lion was pumped in­to the ac­count of the Po­lice Ser­vice and I was di­rect­ed to hire one spe­cif­ic law firm in the Unit­ed King­dom and I was di­rect­ed to en­sure that it was to in­ves­ti­gate po­lit­i­cal op­po­nents of this Gov­ern­ment. No pro­cure­ment process, noth­ing was done,” Grif­fith said.

“The dou­ble stan­dard, the hypocrisy where these in­di­vid­u­als feel that they could own and con­trol the Trea­sury, the court of pub­lic opin­ion will in­deed find them guilty,” he added.

Politics


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored