The Gov­ern­ment says there is no need for a press con­fer­ence or na­tion­al ad­dress on the im­pend­ing ar­rival of a US Navy war­ship.

The Min­istry of For­eign and CARI­COM Af­fairs con­firmed that the USS Grave­ly will dock in Port of Spain from Oc­to­ber 26 to 30 for joint se­cu­ri­ty ex­er­cis­es be­tween the US Ma­rine Ex­pe­di­tionary Unit and the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force. The min­istry said the train­ing will fo­cus on in­fantry tac­tics, main­te­nance, and ad­vanced med­ical skills to strength­en co­op­er­a­tion and readi­ness be­tween both forces.

How­ev­er, the vis­it will al­so dis­rupt op­er­a­tions at the Port of Port of Spain.

Out­side Par­lia­ment, Min­is­ter in the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath said the min­istry’s re­lease was “self-ex­plana­to­ry,” out­lin­ing the terms of the vis­it. When asked whether it was suf­fi­cient, he replied, “That is the in­for­ma­tion that we have com­ing out of the for­eign min­istry, so out­side of that I don’t see any­thing that needs any ex­pla­na­tion.”

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les dis­agreed, say­ing the pop­u­la­tion was en­ti­tled to more de­tails. She said she had not been prop­er­ly briefed and ar­gued that, fol­low­ing the US Em­bassy’s re­lease over the week­end, “the Min­is­ter of For­eign and CARI­COM Af­fairs should make him­self avail­able.”

Around the same time, For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers post­ed a pho­to on so­cial me­dia with Par­lia­men­tary Sec­re­tary Nicholas Mor­ris and min­istry of­fi­cials, cap­tioned: “Min­is­ter of For­eign and CARI­COM Af­fairs, the Ho­n­ourable Sean Sobers MP and the Ho­n­ourable Nicholas Mor­ris MP… hold brief­ing meet­ings with the Ex­ec­u­tive of the MF­CA in prepa­ra­tion for the Min­istry’s at­ten­dance at the Stand­ing Fi­nance Com­mit­tee on Sat­ur­day 25 Oc­to­ber.”

Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der dis­missed the need for a me­dia brief­ing, say­ing, “If you are hear­ing from min­is­ters who li­aise di­rect­ly with the Prime Min­is­ter, it’s her speak­ing through her min­is­ters, so I can­not see that as an is­sue.”

Op­po­si­tion MP Mar­vin Gon­za­les took a dif­fer­ent view, say­ing, “In the con­text of every­thing that is tak­ing place, I would ap­pre­ci­ate if the Gov­ern­ment would speak clear­ly on this mat­ter.”

Gov­ern­ment MP David Lee said the re­lease was ad­e­quate, not­ing that “there have been ves­sels over time, and no one was un­easy.”

Last night, sev­er­al mem­bers of the me­dia con­tact­ed of­fi­cials in the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter re­quest­ing a press con­fer­ence to clar­i­fy the plan. The of­fi­cial promised to raise the con­cern with Min­is­ter Sobers and Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar. How­ev­er, when me­dia fol­lowed up this morn­ing, they were told a re­lease would be is­sued. It was lat­er shared, then al­most im­me­di­ate­ly re­called.