Al-Rawi: Citizens want results and less talk

The Attorney General is pleased with the findings of a recent media poll which shows the ruling PNM slightly ahead of the UNC in the August 10 general election race. He says citizens want results and less talk.

"This is a significant boost to us because we have had to manage in an extremely difficult economy," Faris Al-Rawi told reporters on Monday.

"It shows that Dr (Keith) Rowley's leadership as a political leader has taken us in the right direction. A national poll says a certain thing, but the accuracy of polling at the constituency level is a different thing."

Al-Rawi, the PNM candidate for San Fernando West, was speaking to reporters after he turned the sod for construction of the $120 million San Fernando waterfront car park on the compound of the San Fernando General Hospital.

Confident of returning as MP, Al-Rawi said he is comfortably ahead of his opponents. His focus is exclusively on the constituency, he said.

“I lift my eyes outside of San Fernando only when I perform the AG or Minister of Legal Affairs job, which is a minute-by-minute basis from the back seat of my car or my office."

Al-Rawi threw jabs at the opposition saying under the UNC administration oil was above US$100 per barrel then averaged at US$ 89. The first year the PNM came in power, oil dropped to US $27. This year West Texas Intermediate had dropped to minus US $2. Despite the drop in prices and other issues facing TT like the financial woes at Petrotrin, he said the Government pulled through.

He recalled being given three ministries ­– Justice, AG and Legal Affairs. The cost of that, as one minister running it, was $1.5 billion, Al Rawi said, and when the UNC ran the three, it was $5.08 billion.

"Mrs Kamla Persad-Bissessar wants to create multiple ministries. She wants to destroy the laws I have passed, take away explain your wealth legislation – good luck to her.

"People in San Fernando tell me they are happy to have land ownership; they tell me thank you for decriminalising marijuana. We are focusing on ground-game delivery."

Last Tuesday, officials from the South-West Regional Health Authority (SWRHA) and the Urban Development Corporation (Udecott) signed the deeds for the lands for the car park.

The car park will have eight floors for 1,002 parking spaces, elevators, a wireless cash payment system, security, and video surveillance.

The project has already started, and Al-Rawi on Monday said it is expected to be completed in eight months.