An­drea Perez-Sobers

Se­nior Re­porter

an­drea.perez-sobers

@guardian.co.tt

The Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Ser­vices of Trinidad and To­ba­go (TSTT) has con­firmed an­oth­er change to its board of di­rec­tors, with Nadi­ra Parb­hu­di­al re­sign­ing ef­fec­tive Ju­ly 22, re­duc­ing the ma­jor­i­ty state-owned telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions com­pa­ny’s board to three mem­bers.

Mi­in­is­ter of Pub­lic Util­i­ties Bar­ry Padarath said he had been ad­vised that Parb­hu­di­al stepped down be­cause the de­mands of her job re­quired fre­quent trav­el out­side Trinidad and To­ba­go.
“I am ad­vised that due to the de­mands of her job, which re­quires her to be out of the coun­try of­ten, Parb­hu­di­al re­signed. We wish her the best and thank her for her ser­vice,” Padarath told Guardian Me­dia.

The change was com­mu­ni­cat­ed by TSTT cor­po­rate sec­re­tary Vive­ka Par­gass, who ad­vised that, on Wednes­day, the com­pa­ny’s board now com­pris­es chair­man Kern Dass and di­rec­tors Randy Ram­ta­hal and Cas­sili­na Kelshall.

Par­gass al­so in­struct­ed that on­ly the names of the cur­rent di­rec­tors should ap­pear on all let­ters and of­fi­cial doc­u­men­ta­tion re­quir­ing the names of TSTT’s board mem­bers.

No re­place­ment has yet been an­nounced for the va­cant po­si­tion.

When ques­tioned by Guardian Me­dia about the ear­li­er de­par­ture of for­mer di­rec­tor Kyle Mal­oney, Padarath said his res­ig­na­tion was al­so linked to the de­mands of his pro­fes­sion­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ties.

“The work­load of an or­gan­i­sa­tion like TSTT can be quite heavy and de­mand­ing at times. About a month ago, Mr. Mal­oney was re­placed on the board for sim­i­lar rea­sons re­lat­ed to the de­mands of his job. I al­so thanked him for his ser­vice,” the min­is­ter said. Parb­hu­di­al was ap­point­ed to the TSTT board in June 2025 as part of a five-mem­ber board com­pris­ing chair­man Kern Dass and di­rec­tors Randy Ram­ta­hal, Cas­sili­na Kelshall, Kyle Mal­oney and her­self. Mal­oney ceased serv­ing on the board ear­li­er this month.

The lat­est res­ig­na­tion has prompt­ed a re­sponse from the Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Work­ers’ Union (CWU), which rep­re­sents em­ploy­ees at TSTT.

CWU Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Joanne Ogeer said the union was aware of Parb­hu­di­al’s res­ig­na­tion and not­ed that it was not the first time she had in­di­cat­ed an in­ten­tion to leave the board.

“The union has been made aware of the res­ig­na­tion of di­rec­tor Parb­hu­di­al. In fact, this is not the first time she cit­ed a res­ig­na­tion. As a mat­ter of fact, some­time on or around Feb. 22, 2026, she sig­naled her ex­it,” Ogeer said.

She praised Parb­hu­di­al’s con­duct dur­ing her time on the board. “CWU com­mends Di­rec­tor Parb­hu­di­al for her prin­ci­ples root­ed in in­tegri­ty and a moral com­pass.”

Ogeer said at­ten­tion would now shift to ap­point­ing a re­place­ment di­rec­tor and ex­pressed hope that the se­lec­tion would be based on in­dus­try ex­per­tise. “We can on­ly an­tic­i­pate now that Min­is­ter Padarath will there­fore pro­ceed to fill the po­si­tion with some­one po­lit­i­cal­ly aligned or a fi­nancier.”

She said the telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions sec­tor re­quires di­rec­tors with rel­e­vant ex­pe­ri­ence rather than ap­point­ments based on oth­er con­sid­er­a­tions.

“It will be in­te­gral to ap­point some­one who is ac­tu­al­ly au courant with telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions in an ag­ile tele­com sec­tor and not just square pegs in round holes. We wait and see,” said Ogeer.