Le Hunte tells Kamla: ‘Apologise to African, Indo-Trinis’

PNM vice-chairman Robert Le Hunte on Saturday called on UNC political leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar to publicly apologise to citizens of African and East Indian descent for describing the way Government was bringing home TT nationals as “worse than slavery and indentureship.”

Persad-Bissessar made the claim during a UNC virtual meeting on Thursday. In a video posted on Facebook, Le Hunte told Persad-Bissessar, “When you wake up. at least apologise. apologise to people of African descent and Indian descent.”

He continued, “The equation of people not coming home with slavery. I mean Kamla, come on.” Le Hunte encouraged Persad-Bissessar to “go buy a history book” and read it. He said then Persad-Bissessar would understand what the ancestors of Afro and Indo Trinidadians went through.

Le Hunte said it is undisputed that slavery was terrible, inhumane and “one of the biggest travesties that has happened to civilised people in this world.’ He opined to Persad-Bissessar “to try to equate that, in another country, in another place, with other people, you would have been lynched.”

Le Hunte said Persad-Bissessar’s analogy was as ridiculous as comparing a toothache to the Holocaust.

For someone aspiring to be elected prime minister on August 10, Le Hunte told Persad-Bissessar her statement “shows a little bit of insensitivity to your history and the people that you want to lead.”