Daniel Angelo Austin, CEO of supermarket chain Xtra Foods and board member of the Chaguanas Chamber of Industry and Commerce, is one of the most genial fellows you’ll meet—a smart, can-do bootstraps guy who started low down and worked his way up, by way of an honours MBA and the UK Chartered Institute of Marketing.
I didn’t tell Austin in advance that I’d be writing this. I’m doing it to make a point about State boards, which I’ll get to. I’d run into him now and again in a café that has become a kind of office annex for both of us. The only connection we have is a human one. We’d shoot the breeze, and this is what I learnt over many coffees.
One early job at his company was helping customers take their shopping carts to their cars. He decided, as a customer service extra, to use the tips to buy chocolates/sweets for their children. His mentors were the late Vindra and current chairman Anon Naipaul, cornerstones of the Naipaul family that owns Xtra Foods. Vindra once told him that he would progress far in business. He was at a low rung on the ladder then and couldn’t see himself landing where he is now.
My point is this. As a member of the Board of TSTT who was appointed under the last government, the rules of the game dictated that he had to go when the new one was elected. If so, the rules are dumb and self-harming, and Trinidad and Tobago needs new ones. Austin illustrates a corporate governance culture that throws the baby out with the bathwater, but it can’t be the only example of it. It’s a waste of skills.
I did an MBA years ago. While it didn’t turn me or fellow grads into Bill Gates, we know enough to recognise bad corporate governance practice.
The new Government that took office in early May is continuing the accepted practice—in force for years now—in which all board members are required to resign so that a new administration can appoint new directors.
A clean sweep by new brooms. Understood. Less understandable is the notion that it must be all change. What are the new administrations afraid of? That old directors would leak to their old overlords?
PNM chairman Marvin Gonzales was within his right to challenge the Government on board composition in a country configured the way T&T is. His complaint about the ethnic composition of the boards appointed so far is a matter of legitimate public interest, and the eye test shows that.
When asked to expand on his concern by GML’s Akash Samaroo, he said, “I wonder if we’re living in Bangladesh or Delhi.” He descended into casual racism and missed an opportunity to substantively address the issue. Here’s how he could have done so, minus the lazy commentary that trampled all over his core message.
For the sake of argument, let’s use some made-up numbers. Gonzales could have said something like this: “Of the 200 appointments made to State boards, 140 (70 per cent) are of X group. It does not reflect the rich ethnic diversity of our country. I’m calling on the Government to tell the population what metric it is using for State board selections and whether it aims at having them look like T&T.” That’s half an hour’s work. I’d recommend messaging training for Gonzales.
While it’s important that no government over-stacks State boards with people who look like their base, the head counting misses the point about how counterproductive the entire corporate governance process is. It stems from a toxic political culture in which new administrations seem to see all of their predecessors as scoundrels and incompetents. Seven budgets in, Colm Imbert was still dinging the previous government.
The Government has proceeded clumsily on the issue in a number of cases. And by having a partisan flamethrower as one of their leads, few outside of their circle will trust the process. There needs to be collective will to bell the cat. However, I don’t expect a government determined to use every ounce of its legislative muscle to be open to doing so.
