Political mischief in 'election stunt' talk

THE EDITOR: Prime Minister Young is too clever a politician to believe that granting a $1 million ex-gratia payment to each family of the divers who lost their lives in the Paria tragedy three years ago would bring their votes to his PNM on April 28.

Surely, he would have read that the lone survivor, Christopher Boodram, and the families had mounted a political platform a few weeks ago and declared themselves code yellow. So, for UNC operatives including its political leader to claim Young’s humanitarian gesture was “an election stunt” or “political bribery” or a “manipulative election ploy” is just plain political mischief.

UNC politicians do really have a low opinion of these distressed families to assume that money would bring about a sudden change in their political support. Indeed, Young and his cabinet had a far better opinion of this group when he offered the grant to them. He did say that he did it with a pure heart. And this could be classified as humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

This group already declared its allegiance. It wasn’t for the PNM. So, Young didn’t have to make any offer at all if political gain was his motive. So, this puerile, accusatory narrative against Young is just so much hogwash.

If there are people who have been milking a political benefit from the families’ hurt and pain they would be UNC politicians and some attorneys. They imposed themselves as trusted advisers of the distressed families from day one. Now they are trying to rewrite history to make it appear as if the families were against a commission of enquiry (CoE) because of its high cost.

Let me remind all and sundry of what happened during the early days of the tragedy. When then prime minister Dr Keith Rowley learnt about the mishap, he immediately offered to appoint an independent committee of experts in the field to investigate the incident.

The families, egged on by UNC operatives, trade unionists and some attorneys rejected Rowley’s offer and demanded a CoE. Rowley explained then the vagaries of a CoE, mentioning its costs, time, the untested testimonies that would emerge and the legal ramifications that would follow. They did not listen and demanded a CoE.

So, what now? Who politicised the tragedy? Why blame Rowley, Young and the government when they offered good advice in the first place? Truth be told, the naysayers would have found other reasons to be critical of this humanitarian gesture had it been offered before, during or after an election season.

HARRY PARTAP
former MP