There has been loud back­lash fol­low­ing Min­is­ter of Sports Sham­fa Cud­joe’s crit­i­cism of Bud­get 2023 crit­ics.

Both Op­po­si­tion UNC MP Michelle Ben­jamin and Move­ment for So­cial Jus­tice (MSJ) leader David Ab­du­lah have de­nounced Cud­joe’s re­cent re­marks, with Ben­jamin even call­ing for Cud­joe to apol­o­gise.

At a Tacarigua com­mu­ni­ty cen­tre func­tion on Wednes­day, Cud­joe re­port­ed­ly lashed out at crit­ics of the Bud­get, say­ing there were some peo­ple who “nev­er worked a day in their lives and were still re­ceiv­ing a pen­sion, as the safe­ty net re­mained strong” and that “peo­ple want­ed eve­ry­thing right now.”

Ben­jamin said the state­ments were “un­be­liev­able, un­couth, cold and cal­lous and an out of touch rant on cit­i­zens’ sac­ri­fice.”

Ben­jamin said, “The Min­is­ter is talk­ing about sac­ri­fice. While she may be able to swipe her card and buy any­thing her heart de­sires, ba­sic food items are be­yond the reach for the av­er­age cit­i­zen be­cause of Gov­ern­ment’s dra­con­ian poli­cies, where the on­ly plan is to make the rich get rich­er with noth­ing trick­ling down to the poor, ex­cept of course hav­ing to pay for their bad de­ci­sions.”

She called on Cud­joe to apol­o­gise.

“In­stead of talk­ing down to cit­i­zens, the Min­is­ter for Sport and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment should come to com­mu­ni­ties and ex­pe­ri­ence first-hand the suf­fer­ing of fam­i­lies who are suf­fer­ing. The Min­is­ter owes it to the pop­u­la­tion to is­sue a clear and un­equiv­o­cal apol­o­gy.”

Ben­jamin al­so deemed Cud­joe’s re­marks, a “clear in­di­ca­tion of Gov­ern­ment’s dis­dain for av­er­age, hard­work­ing cit­i­zens and true pa­tri­ots.”

“Is the Min­is­ter say­ing the home­mak­ers, women who spent time build­ing the fam­i­ly, and prepar­ing the doc­tors, lawyers, teach­ers and sport­ing per­son­al­i­ties we have to­day, that they de­serve less? If any­thing, they de­serve more. Were it not for them and their labour of love, many of those in po­si­tions of pow­er and au­thor­i­ty to­day wouldn’t have been where they are.”

Mean­while, MSJ leader Ab­du­lah asked the Min­is­ter, “Did you sac­ri­fice your tax-free car Sham­fa?”

Ab­du­lah said he was “to­tal­ly dis­gust­ed by the ar­ro­gance of the PNM Gov­ern­ment.”

He added, “From Prime Min­is­ter to Sham­fa Cud­joe, their ut­ter­ances are sim­ply get­ting more and more peo­ple ex­treme­ly an­gry.”

Ab­du­lah said the Prime Min­is­ter, “as usu­al, be­rat­ed cit­i­zens for not mak­ing the right choice” on ve­hi­cles, time to leave home so as to not be in traf­fic and burn fu­el and for not be­ing dis­ci­plined enough to make work-from- home a re­al op­tion.

He added, “Then it was Min­is­ter Cud­joe’s time to heap scorn on the pop­u­la­tion. ‘Why is it so hard to sac­ri­fice’ she asked. First­ly, the MSJ, like so many peo­ple, asks – what have you sac­ri­ficed re­cent­ly Ms Cud­joe? Did you and your par­lia­men­tary col­leagues give up your perk of a tax-free ve­hi­cle?

“If not, when last did you buy a new car, tax free? And how much did you sell the pre­vi­ous one for? You have your salary, a trav­el­ling al­lowance and oth­er al­lowances. You have a dri­ver to take you around. Did you sac­ri­fice any of these? Did you take a pay cut?”

Ab­du­lah con­tin­ued, “But what about the sin­gle moth­er who works as a se­cu­ri­ty guard – 12 hours dai­ly, with­out over­time; and who has to hus­tle pub­lic trans­port very ear­ly to get to work for 6 am be­cause if she’s late her pay will be de­duct­ed, and she doesn’t get home till af­ter 8 pm. Are you say­ing this work­er, who hasn’t had a wage in­crease in years isn’t mak­ing a sac­ri­fice?”

He al­so raised sev­er­al oth­er ex­am­ples, as he ques­tioned Cud­joe over who was mak­ing a sac­ri­fice.

Ab­du­lah end­ed his mes­sage to Cud­joe by ques­tion­ing her lack of care.

“Your ar­ro­gance is tru­ly dis­gust­ing and the lack of care for the peo­ple whom you were elect­ed to serve can no longer be tol­er­at­ed. And this goes for many of the oth­er min­is­ters who take their cue from their leader.”