Hosein to corporations: Listen to youth council

Minister of Rural Development and Local Government Kazim Hosein said the mayors and chairmen of regional corporations should give thought to holding a meeting together with the 11-member panel of the Sangre Grande Junior Council to hear their thoughts about what they thought the country needed.

For the first time the Sangre Grande Regional Corporation (SGRC), in fact, any regional corporation, held a sitting of a junior council in TT, all of whom were students. The event was held Tuesday at the SGRC’s boardroom.

Hosein said he was moved to tears by the youngsters’ passion for their region. The minister said he worked for many years as a councillor and then mayor before he became minister. He urged the young people to continue with their work within their community as they were tomorrow’s future.

“I am so overjoyed this morning. Chairman (Martin Terry) Rondon and the CEO (Diane Lackhan) must be highly commended for the event. This is a day in history of TT.

“All the chairmen and mayors, councillors and aldermen in all corporations, at a venue somewhere in this country, and invite this junior council to meet and show how to lead the way. They are so exceptionally well spoken, well dressed, they addressed the chair with dignity, respect... I observed you all very well,” Hosein said.

The minister said he was well pleased that the young people put their community first and not politics.

“I didn’t hear anything about PNM or UNC or PEP. You all put the people first and you should be highly commended. There is a time for politics and when the bell rings you know election is coming. When you get into office you represent everybody. I was a councillor for ten years before I became mayor at San Fernando City Corporation and before I worked in every position within the corporation.

“Take this opportunity to help people because Local Government was about people. This job is to serve the community. You have to be very humble, you can’t get vex with anybody because the day you get vex, three years in office passes very, very fast and remember you have to come back and ask them for your support for the next election,” he said.

The media was not forgotten in the part it played in politics and getting the messages across to the public.

“We politicians take the media for granted. The media plays a very important role in whatever we do in this country and the chairman said.” he said.

Rondon had warned the young people not to dismiss the media lightly as “media can make you, or break you.”

He also urged them to pay homage to their parents, especially their mothers, who were like diamonds, and to treat them with love and respect.