Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

Se­nior Re­porter

eliz­a­beth.gon­za­les@guardian.co.tt

Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) To­ba­go Coun­cil leader An­cil Den­nis has claimed that To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty (TPP) can­di­date Ricky Joe­field pre­vi­ous­ly ben­e­fit­ed from near­ly $10 mil­lion in con­tracts un­der a PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion, de­spite now con­test­ing the elec­tion un­der the TPP ban­ner.

Den­nis made the claim while ad­dress­ing a PNM po­lit­i­cal meet­ing in Dar­rel Spring/Whim, where he crit­i­cised the cur­rent To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly and de­fend­ed the PNM’s record on sup­port­ing To­ba­go con­trac­tors.

Ac­cord­ing to Den­nis, Joe­field — who is chal­leng­ing PNM in­cum­bent Kelvon Mor­ris in the Dar­rel Spring/Whim elec­toral dis­trict — is a To­ba­go con­trac­tor who ben­e­fit­ed dur­ing a pe­ri­od when the PNM pri­ori­tised lo­cal com­pa­nies and labour.

Den­nis said the arrange­ment un­der pre­vi­ous PNM ad­min­is­tra­tions en­sured that con­tracts re­mained in To­ba­go, sus­tain­ing em­ploy­ment and keep­ing mon­ey cir­cu­lat­ing in the is­land’s econ­o­my.

He said that ap­proach changed over the last four years un­der the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly, led by Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine, which he said weak­ened the con­struc­tion sec­tor and left many lo­cal con­trac­tors strug­gling.

De­spite his crit­i­cism, Den­nis said a fu­ture PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion would not dis­crim­i­nate against con­trac­tors based on po­lit­i­cal af­fil­i­a­tion, in­clud­ing Joe­field.

“He’ll get more work,” Den­nis said. “We don’t vic­timise no­body.”

Den­nis said un­der the PNM, there would be no di­vi­sion along par­ty lines when it comes to the award of con­tracts, say­ing To­ba­go be­longs to all To­bag­o­ni­ans.

“There will be no PNM con­trac­tor. There will be no TPP con­trac­tor,” he said. “All you will have are To­ba­go con­trac­tors.”

Con­tact­ed by Guardian Me­dia, Joe­field de­clined to com­ment di­rect­ly on Den­nis’ claims. He briefly said he would not be drawn in­to what he de­scribed as a “smear-style cam­paign.”