Gail Alexan­der

Keep close to con­stituents, don't get vexed with any­body –and al­ways an­swer your phone.

This was the ad­vice giv­en by Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Kaz­im Ho­sein to new­ly-sworn in Port-of-Spain coun­cil­lors yes­ter­day.

"God gives you two ears and one mouth–lis­ten more and talk less and get the job done," he said.

Ho­sein was speak­ing briefly at the swear­ing-in cer­e­mo­ny at the Port-of-Spain City Cor­po­ra­tion. Twelve coun­cil­lors who were elect­ed in the re­cent lo­cal gov­ern­ment polls, took the oath of of­fice.

Ho­sein, a for­mer may­or of San Fer­nan­do, said he had trav­elled the road that new coun­cil­lors are em­bark­ing on.

"It was a re­al strug­gle."

He said he served in lo­cal gov­ern­ment for 40 years in every de­part­ment of the field. Ho­sein as­sured Gov­ern­ment would give coun­cils the nec­es­sary re­sources and would en­sure lo­cal gov­ern­ment re­form, takes place. He said this should be achieved very soon.

Ho­sein re­lat­ed that when he was a coun­cil­lor he walked his area–Les Ef­forts/Cipero–every three months. He said that was the se­cret of his suc­cess.

"Every three months I'd walk house to house, so much that the chil­dren knew me. Once, a day I was walk­ing a child called out to his par­ents, 'Mam­my, mam­my, look the PNM man come back again.'"

Ad­vis­ing coun­cil­lors to keep in close con­tact with res­i­dents of the ar­eas they served, he said, he would not want peo­ple to feel– as some say–that politi­cians on­ly come round at elec­tion time.

"Be hum­ble at all times, you can't get vexed with any­body. An­swer your phone. You don't want to anger any­body as peo­ple have ex­pec­ta­tions. You all have asked to serve, so you have to serve the peo­ple...have con­sul­ta­tions at all lev­els and things will work out."

He said coun­cil­lors are the first con­tact of gov­ern­ment and the pow­er was in the hands of lo­cal gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials.

Min­is­ter in the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young told coun­cil­lors Gov­ern­ment was count­ing on them to de­liv­er.

"Serve every cit­i­zen, live up to the na­tion­al an­them's mot­to – every creed and race find an equal place."

Young said lo­cal gov­ern­ment re­form leg­is­la­tion would be pre­sent­ed in the first quar­ter of 2017.