PM slams Kamla’s claims: EMBD's case not about race

THE Prime Minister said new allegations in court over payments by a former board of the EMDB have nothing to do with race nor elections, addressing a news briefing at Whitehall, Port of Spain, on February 14.

The Estate Management and Business Development Company (EMBD) prepares access to plots for former sugar-cane workers.

Dr Rowley said he was supposed to be in Tobago, but had to counter reports in one newspaper which had cited opposition allegations.

One newspaper had quoted Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar alleging, “This is the tenth year that the PNM has been pathetically peddling these same tired allegations without getting anywhere. Every election, EMBD is the PNM manifesto because they have no achievements to speak of.

“This is just the same lame and lazy electioneering from the PNM for their base, as always, so they can run their racist ground campaign that ‘all them Indian is thief.’ They love to fabricate these cases to then pay tens of millions to PNM ‘eat a food’ lawyers, and then the case gets thrown out.”

Rowley read the latest news headlines, scoffing at the allegations of “election smear,” “fabricated,” “PNM propaganda,” and “electioneering.”

Marvelling, he mused, “That is how a former prime minister responds.”

He quoted a cabinet note #1656 dated July 1, 2015 (under the former PP government) that had sought approval to pay contractors $400 million. The note said cabinet had already approved payments on roads and infrastructure to upgrade 14 sites for former workers of Caroni (1975) Ltd. These sums were $2.58 billion, $781 million, $1.65 billion and $330 million already approved, plus the additional $400 million sought.

Rowley said in 2017, contractors filed a lawsuit against the EMBD to get payments, but a week later the EMBD filed a counter-claim to each of three matters. He said the EMBD’s claim alleged collusion by former officials to pay $300 million for 12 contracts for “defective and overpriced work.”

He said the contractors had tried to strike out the EMBD’s action and had asked the EMBD to provide particulars but in 2020 Justice James Aboud in the High Court rejected the contractors’ claim.

The PM said, “It had nothing to do with the PNM or election timing.”

He said in 2023, the Appeal Court dismissed contractors’ appeals, with Justice Peter Rajkumar saying the EMBD had successfully said it had suffered a financial loss.

The PM said, “What was ‘tried’ is that there was a case to be tried.”

He said contractors sought to go both indirectly and directly to the Privy Council but failed on both counts.

“They are now required to put in their defence, so the substance of the matter can be heard in the court and the evidence can be adjudicated upon by the court.”

Rowley said it had always been a court matter. He lamented Persad-Bissessar, as a former prime minister, telling the population that EMBD was just “a PNM matter and election propaganda.”

Rowley claimed two officers of State were attempting a deception against the people of TT.

The PM scoffed at individuals speaking about “election propaganda” and “PNM smear.”

Rowley said the PNM’s greatest legacy, with party founder Dr Eric Williams’ guidance, was interracial solidarity which held up TT as a model nation.

“You have two people in trouble with the law over the money – with a court matter involving judges and the Privy Council – saying to you that this is about the PNM trying to smear – how it’s put – Indians as thieves.

“So because Mrs Persad-Bissessar has attracted that epithet unto herself, she now is prepared to defend Dr Moonilal by implicating every Indian in TT and saying that it is the PNM who say it is so.

“I want to say something here to the people of TT, especially the East Indian population: you have nothing to fear from the rest of the population.

“The law would determine who is police and who is thief.”

Rowley accused Persad-Bissessar of “a particularly offensive comment.”

“We have Indian children here in primary school, in kindergarten, in university. We have people of the Indian population in the Public Service at every level.

“Rather than put your defence as the court requires them to do, (individuals were) seeking now to hide under the wings of the East Indian population. The population and the PNM and the Government will have none of it.

“This has nothing to do with your race. It has to do with your personal character.”

He alleged that this was now normal behaviour by Persad-Bissessar and those around her.

“This (newspaper) headline today is by aspirants to higher office.”

Rowley said at a 2017 meeting of Commonwealth heads, the then UK prime minister David Cameron had invited select leaders to a special anti-corruption summit, attended by the likes of the IMF, World Bank and Interpol. Saying TT had then resolutely committed itself against white-collar crime, he said the EMBD’s approach to the law courts was therefore nothing out of the ordinary.

He named other scandals linked to UNC personalities, namely the Piarco Airport project, Lifesport and the near-loss of $971 million to OAS Construtora on the Point Fort Highway project.

In the latter, just before the 2015 general election a clause was removed from a contract which had said bankruptcy would result in the Government being paid money held in a bond.

Rowley cited Cumuto/Manzanilla MP Dr Rai Ragbir recently alleging the UNC shielded wrongdoing (to which Persad-Bissessar had replied “Nobody cares”) and a former police commissioner alleging the UNC was a “criminal unit” operating as a political party.

Rowley said, “The normalisation of criminal conduct in our society has to stop, and trying to give the impression that ‘nobody cares.’”

He said Government MPs had taken a vow to act without malice or ill-will, and so would do what they could against white-collar crime in TT.

The PM advised listeners, “Ask people standing for public office, ‘What is your character like?’”

Saying the EMBD court case still stood unresolved, he said, “Once you go before the court, the Government has no say or no role.”