UNC: Claiming East Indian heritage, Stuart is 'Lal Beharry' Young

NOW that prime minister-select Stuart Young has publicly claimed he has East Indian roots in Penal/Debe, the UNC has rechristened him with two names – Stuart Lal Beharry Young and Stuart Rajesh Young.

Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar, in an address delivered on her behalf by UNC deputy Political Leader Jearlean John, said Young should be ashamed to reveal this personal connection to a region which he has studiously ignored while serving as a government minister for the past nine years.

At a UNC cottage meeting on Monday, which Persad-Bissesar did not attend, John said residents who live close to Young's blood relatives have been starved of state resources and basic necessities and she wondered how he can reconcile his failure to have the UWI Debe campus and other educational institutions that would have been a resource to south Trinidad, opened.

“Over the last ten years under Rajesh and Rowley, the PNM government ridiculed and disparaged residents of Penal Debe and have allocated less than the bare minimum necessary for communities in Penal and Debe to grow and thrive.

“I want to tell Stuart Rajesh Young to miss us with that pathetic, awkward and comical public relations gimmickry.

“For the entire time he served as a Minister in the Office of a Prime Minister, he had the ability to venture into any ministry and help Penal/Debe, but not once did he ever do that! Residents of these areas will not forget that fact when they go to the polls later this year,” Persad-Bissessar said in her address read by John.

She wondered about Young's sudden revelation of ancestral East Indian roots just when he was about to offer himself as a prime ministerial candidate.

“Having only spoken of his Chinese heritage up until this point, the country is left to wonder if Stuart was hiding his East Indian roots until it suddenly became beneficial to his political career to announce it.

“Stuart is the local Kamala Harris (former US vice president who failed in her bid for the White House) as he is race-fluid. Next week he might tell us that his middle name is Rajesh.

“Listen, do not study Rowley with his baseless nonsense about Young’s race…This is Trinidad and Tobago! Nobody cares about yuh race. In the UNC, we have the original Dougla. Nobody in this country cares if Young green, blue, yellow or red.

“People care that Young is mean-spirited. People care that he is vulgar, crass and vicious. People care that Stuart Young is useless. People care that he has no achievements even after getting every opportunity for ten years sitting at Rowley’s feet.

“People care that Young cannot face his own PNM people and compete with one-man, one-vote, it is now 'young man no vote' and he chooses instead to limbo below the white line in the road to become prime minister.”

Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Moonilal also weighed in on Young's recent revelation admonishing supporters, “not to take basket from Young, who in all his years in office did nothing for the people of Penal/Debe district.”

He said the PNM was so out of touch with that area that Rowley said Young was from Lal Beharry Trace, Penal.

“Lal Beharry Trace is in Debe! If you give Rowley a map, he would not know where to find Lal Beharry Trace! When he was Housing Minister, he came to open housing settlements there and he got lost.

“I remember seeing him with a jeep-load of police and we had to give them directions. So, don't be fooled by all that stupidness of Young being from Lal Beharry Trace. In all his years as an executive officer, he never sent one hamper, one toy, fix one road!

"The only roots he can attest to are grass roots growing in the cracks on the road. Nothing else, so don't get chain up with that kind of stupidness."