Gail Alexan­der

If the vis­it of the US Navy med­ical mis­sion ship USNS Com­fort as­sists those seek­ing help there, the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress Gov­ern­ment is al­so seek­ing com­fort on var­i­ous is­sues which con­tin­ue con­fronting the ad­min­is­tra­tion - and in cer­tain cas­es, cre­at­ing them for the past Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment gov­ern­ment al­so.

Be­yond spec­u­la­tion on her own health, Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s vis­it to the US med­ical ship, along­side US Em­bassy of­fi­cials, was geared to­wards send­ing “com­fort” sig­nals on and on the “health” of T&T/US re­la­tions and how Gov­ern­ment’s tack­ling its lat­est chal­lenge - the Unit­ed States’ 15 per cent tar­iff on T&T ex­ports.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s ref­er­ence to con­ver­sa­tions “with our friends in the US” may raise hope for a pos­i­tive res­o­lu­tion. But the ab­sence from Thurs­day’s post-Cab­i­net me­dia brief­ing of any of the five min­is­ters - who Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dave Tan­coo said are play­ing a role in the mat­ter - left no op­por­tu­ni­ty for fur­ther in­for­ma­tion on a mat­ter which im­pacts T&T and cit­i­zens.

Gov­ern­ment’s fo­cus on meet­ing its elec­tion cam­paign promis­es and re­tool­ing sys­tems has giv­en rise to tack­ling the dou­ble wham­my in­volved in the tar­iff, which hits at the heart of T&T’s main rev­enue stream­ers - en­er­gy and man­u­fac­tur­ing ex­ports. Plus, there’s the im­pact from im­ports of US brand goods orig­i­nat­ing in high tar­iff coun­tries, car­ry­ing high­er prices, and en­com­pass­ing items pop­u­lar in T&T.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s al­ter­na­tive of seek­ing ex­port mar­kets for en­er­gy will sub­ject T&T to scruti­ny, in­clud­ing as a coun­try hav­ing two states of emer­gen­cies over six months. With the SoE im­pact on T&T’s pro­file still ahead, Tan­coo said Tues­day, “Thus far, I’ve de­ter­mined no dis­cernible im­pact of the SoE on the rev­enue or pro­duc­tive ca­pac­i­ty of T&T’s econony.”

A “Per­fect Storm” of chal­lenge fac­tors al­so placed the tar­iff’s ar­rival at a point when Gov­ern­ment’s first (2026) Bud­get is at the tra­di­tion­al pe­ri­od of head­ing to com­ple­tion. Tan­coo’s con­stituen­cy re­cent­ly stat­ed de­liv­ery would be in “Sep­tem­ber/Oc­to­ber.” Tar­iff ef­fect is ahead on pro­ject­ed rev­enue and 2026 fis­cal plans for a Gov­ern­ment still to meet ma­jor cam­paign promis­es for wait­ing sup­port­ers and man­ag­ing eco­nom­ic con­straints (lat­ter, which Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath ac­knowl­edged Thurs­day).

Gov­ern­ment, boast­ing “Fix It” mantra, has at­tempt­ed to seek so­lu­tions speed­i­ly as is­sues arise, in­clud­ing the SoE af­ter crim­i­nal el­e­ment push­back against so­cial pro­gramme re­struc­tur­ing. But the ad­min­is­tra­tion’s in­creas­ing­ly con­front­ed with the fact that talk is cheap, walk­ing it is cost­ly and pa­tience is at a pre­mi­um.

Un­lim­it­ed to Tues­day’s com­plaint by an Oropouche East sup­port­er re­gard­ing the ef­fect on the area from the lack of so­cial pro­gramme jobs. Cer­tain Gov­ern­ment front­lin­ers dai­ly pub­licly push back and soothe crit­i­cism and ap­peals, cit­ing achieve­ments to date.

At Tues­day’s Oropouche East meet­ing, min­is­ters had to tell per­sons ea­ger­ly seek­ing ad­vice on fir­ing at in­trud­ers that the pro­posed stand-your-ground law wasn’t a leg­isla­tive li­cense to kill - a step away from Per­sad- Bisses­sar’s Op­po­si­tion era or­ders to “Light em up!” and “Emp­ty the ‘mat­ic!”

Gov­ern­ment’s con­ces­sions will con­tin­ue in or­der to ce­ment “ground” con­nec­tion. How much its pop­ulist of­fer­ings cost and fund­ing are ahead. Ce­ment­ing base, Per­sad Bisses­sar, at next Mon­day’s UNC meet­ing, will de­tail Gov­ern­ment’s first three months of achieve­ments. Lat­est, Cab­i­net’s re­jec­tion of an elec­tric­i­ty rate hike “at this time,” how­ev­er, leaves the sit­u­a­tion “live” for lat­er.

Re­tool­ing to se­cure T&T’s top pri­or­i­ties - econ­o­my and safe­ty - may push cer­tain mat­ters in­to 2026. This in­cludes re­fur­bish­ment of the Prime Min­is­ter’s St Ann’s res­i­dence. It’s con­firmed Per­sad-Bisses­sar won’t move there this year due to sig­nif­i­cant re­pairs need­ed. Sources con­ced­ed the US tar­iff could al­so af­fect costs/ma­te­ri­als ac­cord­ing to re­quire­ments.

Mean­while, the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al’s move to probe the PNM’s han­dling of UNC front­lin­er Jack Warn­er’s court mat­ter, the “Life­line for Jack,” may be seen in same vein as the past gov­ern­ment’s “Mer­cy for Mal­com” (Jones) law­suit halt. Both po­lit­i­cal sides wooed African Eman­ci­pa­tion Day au­di­ences: the for­mer with repa­ra­tions thrust, lat­ter with the re­moval of Christo­pher Colum­bus’ stat­ue and the Kwame Ture Street name, re­vers­ing the PNM’s po­si­tion against Ture.

But Op­po­si­tion chal­lenge of the Gov­ern­ment on is­sues is be­ing ham­strung by the un­earthing of var­i­ous is­sues, the lat­est be­ing the Com­mu­ni­ty-based En­vi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion and En­hance­ment Pro­gramme Com­pa­ny pro­gramme, pre­sent­ing ques­tions for the past ad­min­is­tra­tion.

Amid is­sues, it’s ahead how both sides up­hold the ad­mirable lessons of In­de­pen­dent sen­a­tor De­oroop Teemal’s life, for the lega­cy of this solid­ly un­fail­ing pa­tri­ot, to be tru­ly ho­n­oured.