Ger­ard Best

Min­is­ter of Sport Anil Roberts has of­fered his res­ig­na­tionas MP for D'Abadie/O'Meara and Min­is­ter of Sport.

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sarhas ac­cept­ed Roberts' res­ig­na­tion as Min­is­ter, in the wake of sev­er­al al­le­ga­tions of cor­rup­tion aris­ing from the Life Sport pro­gramme. Act­ing Pres­i­dent Tim­o­thy Hamel-Smith is­to ap­point Ru­pert Grif­fith as the new Sport Min­is­ter.

The PMan­nounced the change in min­is­te­r­i­al port­fo­lio at the post Cab­i­net me­dia con­fer­ence at 4.45pm but she­made no men­tion of ac­cept­ing Roberts'res­ig­na­tion as MP.

That res­ig­na­tion­was of­fered in an un­signed one-page let­ter sent to the PM at 2.15pm, ob­tained by the T&T Guardian. If the PM were to ac­cept his res­ig­na­tion as MP, his con­stituen­cy would not hold a by-elec­tion,as the gov­ern­ment is al­ready in its fifth year.

In­sist­ing that he has been cleared of any wrong­do­ing in the Life Sport au­dit, Roberts last week said he will not ten­der his res­ig­na­tion from the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship Gov­ern­ment.

In May, a video went vi­ral show­ing show­ing a per­son re­sem­bling a gov­ern­ment min­is­ter rolling a sub­stance be­lieved to be mar­i­jua­na in­to a cig­a­rette in a ho­tel room with two women. Last month, Roberts told the PM he has nev­er used drugs, in­clud­ing mar­i­jua­na, dur­ing his tenure as min­is­ter and "nev­er tak­en, used or ex­per­i­ment­ed with il­lic­it or il­le­gal drugs or ever been in­volved in any form or fash­ion with pros­ti­tutes."Per­sad-Bisses­sar sub­se­quent­ly said she had no rea­son to re­move Roberts from her Cab­i­net.

Tues­day's Guardian ed­i­to­r­i­al called for the PM­to fire Roberts: "Since Sport Min­is­ter Anil Roberts re­fus­es to re­sign over the Life Sport con­tro­ver­sy, it is now up to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar to fire him from her Cab­i­net."

Roberts was first elect­ed to the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives on Mon­day May 24, 2010. He was ap­point­ed Min­is­ter of Sporton May 29, 2010.

Be­fore he en­tered par­ty pol­i­tics, he was al­ready well known as the swim­ming coach of Olympic Bronze Medal win­ner George Bovell III, and as the host of pop­u­lar tele­vi­sion sports show, Spalk.