Panday's cabinet collegues hail former prime minister

FORMER prime minister Basdeo Panday, 90, who died on Monday was fondly recalled by members of his Cabinet talking to Newsday on Tuesday.

They each said Panday improved aspects of Trinidad and Tobago that were still distinctive today.

Former trade minister Mervyn Assam said, "I visited many countries with him. I learnt from him. He was a man of much experience – as a lawyer, trade unionist and politician – and he excelled in each.

"He was a man of great energy and was very concerned about uniting TT."

Assam scotched any notion of Panday being racist.

"His cabinet was the most diversified cabinet in the history of TT."

Assam said, in just six years, the Panday Government had produced huge benefits for the people of TT, including the most modern legislation and the most modern construction.

Assam boasted that despite a very low global oil price reducing TT's energy revenues, Panday had built many bridges, roads, schools, hospitals, clinics and police stations across TT.

"He lived a tremendously full life. I had the greatest respect for what he did for TT. I always enjoyed his company."

Newsday asked Assam for any personal recollection about Panday.

Assam replied, "He had a habit of coming to the cabinet and telling ministers of certain things he observed during his travels around the country. And he expected them to fix these ills.

"You would be surprised that he always came back to remind the cabinet minister or ministers of whether they had complied or not.

"So he was always in terms of whatever there was a need to be undertaken for the ordinary, poor citizen. That was one of his interesting habits as PM."

Assam revealed that Panday was a stickler for punctuality, especially at meetings.

"He was an extremely punctual man. If you were not on time, you were left out."

Assam recalled Panday was much-loved within Caricom. "I went to every Caricom meeting with him and he was the darling of the meeting. People loved him. They called him 'Bas.'"

Assam said Panday had taken him to the funeral of Cheddi Jagan, late Guyanese president. He recalled Panday's words of advice to him at that funeral, now ironically apt.

"Irrespective of how much power you have, you will have to face your mortality one day."

Former attorney general Ramesh Maharaj said, "As prime minister, notwithstanding differences with some of his MPs including me, there is no doubt that his government brought progress to TT."

He said that government had pledged to bring crime under control and had done so by way of the efforts of Panday, national security minister Joe Theodore and himself as attorney general.

Maharaj said, despite low oil-prices, people had very good lives.

"There was poverty but it was a reduced. He was able to weather the storm."

He said during the Panday administration, the Dole Chadee gang was executed and its lands taken and turned into a drug rehab centre, which was launched by then US AG Janet Reno.

"We had a Shiprider Agreement to prevent drugs coming into the country.

"Drug lords were extradited. The crime rate went down. People were able to walk the streets."

Maharaj said under him, TT had seen great legal reforms.

Opposition Senator Wade Mark, a former Speaker in the Kamla Persad-Bissessar government, hailed Panday for the new laws his government had passed.

Mark boasted of the Equal Opportunities Act, Freedom of Information Act and Judicial Review Act. He said the latter let anyone challenge a public authority in its decision-making process.

"Mr Panday legislated the Maternity Protection Act, to protect women from losing their jobs upon getting pregnant.

"Mr Panday has made an extraordinary and unprecedented contribution to our quality of life, our standard of living and the quality of our democracy."

Mark praised Panday for establishing joint select committees (JSCs) of Parliament by amending the TT Constitution with section 66A.

He praised Panday for improving the level of the old age pension.

"He established, for the first time, a national minimum wage."

Prior to that, workers had been governed by sectoral wage levels, Mark related.

While the minimum wage has been raised since then to a current level of $20.50 set by the Government, Mark declared, "Ordinary workers owe a debt of gratitude to Basdeo Panday."

He hailed Panday for creating the Baptist Liberation Day public holiday, grating 30 acres of land for a cathedral, and building the first Baptist primary school after which Persad-Bissessar had initiated the first Baptist secondary school. Mark hailed him for lifting a ban on civil rights campaigner Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael) entering his homeland, TT.

He said Panday had stood for equality, social justice, equal opportunity and fairness.

Mark likened Panday to biblical patriarch, Moses. "While Moses parted the sea, Panday parted the cane fields for sugar workers for an end to discrimination, alienation and poor wages.

"Today they are scholarship winners, doctors, lawyers, engineers and dentists – a tremendous contribution to humanity and to TT."