PM: Ferry reports traumatising the country

Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley PHOTO BY KERWIN PIERRE.
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley PHOTO BY KERWIN PIERRE.

The media again came up for censure by the Prime Minister, this time for reports made on the new ferry for Tobago, the Jean de La Valetta.

The issue of the new ferry to replace the TT Express was a hot topic in the Senate on Tuesday with UNC Senator Wade Mark questioning the procurement process. Mark alleged the ferry was defective and that a director in the company that owned it faced criminal charges in Malta.

Asked about the controversy surrounding the ferry, Dr Keith Rowley, who was touring Greenvale, La Horquetta, which suffered massive flooding last year, said he was not about controversy, but about getting the work done.

"What I am disappointed in, I must say to you the media, you cannot just report every piece of mischief that somebody comes up with and traumatise the country with it without being able to say that the information is in your files, in your database, in your archives, that took the line of what mischief makers are trying to say."

Rowley said he was "quite astounded" to see the statement from the Works Ministry that a ferry was due here in May was being put across as some surprise to the country with certain mischief makers saying 'I was not consulted.'

"What is going on? Why are we traumatising the country? If you had gone back to your files you would have seen on numerous occasions I've said to this country what the situation was with the Express. Why we were not sending the Express for repairs, what we are going to do having not repaired the Express, how are we going to replace it. You would have seen many Government spokespersons, the minister...we've gone out to tender asking for best bids, you would have seen us saying that we got responses and evaluations are taking place."

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