Akash Sama­roo

Lead Ed­i­tor-Pol­i­tics

akash.sama­roo@cnc3.co.tt

Fresh spec­u­la­tion about an im­pend­ing Cab­i­net reshuf­fle is swirling, with a re­cent act­ing ap­point­ment in­volv­ing one of the min­is­ters named in a pur­port­ed Cab­i­net list adding an­oth­er lay­er to the spec­u­la­tion.

A de­tailed three-pan­el list cir­cu­lat­ing on so­cial me­dia pro­pos­es sev­er­al changes to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s Cab­i­net, in­clud­ing nam­ing Min­is­ter Sean Sobers as Min­is­ter of En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries.

Sep­a­rate­ly, an Ex­tra­or­di­nary Gazette pub­lished on Mon­day con­firmed that Sobers had been ap­point­ed to act as En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries Min­is­ter dur­ing the ab­sence from Trinidad and To­ba­go of sub­stan­tive min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mooni­lal.

Ac­cord­ing to the Gazette, Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo, act­ing on the ad­vice of the Prime Min­is­ter and un­der Sec­tion 79(2) of the Con­sti­tu­tion, ap­point­ed Sobers to act in Mooni­lal’s of­fice with ef­fect from Sep­tem­ber 13 and “con­tin­u­ing dur­ing the ab­sence” of Mooni­lal from Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Mooni­lal, how­ev­er, ap­pears to have since re­turned to Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Yes­ter­day, a post on Mooni­lal’s so­cial me­dia page said he vis­it­ed the Debe Hin­du Pri­ma­ry School, where he in­ter­act­ed with stu­dents dur­ing a pet­ting zoo ac­tiv­i­ty.

The de­vel­op­ment comes as ques­tions con­tin­ue to sur­round the au­then­tic­i­ty of the pur­port­ed Cab­i­net reshuf­fle list.

Some peo­ple named on the list have pri­vate­ly de­nied its au­then­tic­i­ty, while ques­tions sent to Per­sad-Bisses­sar seek­ing clar­i­fi­ca­tion on whether a reshuf­fle is be­ing con­tem­plat­ed went unan­swered up to press time.

Of those con­tact­ed, Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Hous­ing Phillip Alexan­der was the on­ly per­son to re­spond on the record, speak­ing briefly to re­porters on his way in­to Par­lia­ment yes­ter­day.

The cir­cu­lat­ing list pro­pos­es sev­er­al ma­jor changes to key port­fo­lios.

It names Sad­dam Ho­sein as a new At­tor­ney Gen­er­al, Sobers as Min­is­ter of En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries, Gary Grif­fith as Min­is­ter of De­fence and Saira Lakhan as Min­is­ter of Land and Le­gal Af­fairs.

It al­so pro­pos­es Wil­fred Nicholas Mor­ris for For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs and Phillip Alexan­der, who cur­rent­ly serves as a Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Hous­ing, as Min­is­ter of Agri­cul­ture and Fish­eries.

The doc­u­ment lists Per­sad-Bisses­sar as re­main­ing Prime Min­is­ter, while sug­gest­ing Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dav­en­dranath Tan­coo, Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der, Jus­tice Min­is­ter De­vesh Ma­haraj, Plan­ning Min­is­ter Dr Kennedy Swarats­ingh and sev­er­al oth­ers would re­tain their port­fo­lios.

Asked about the doc­u­ment and the sug­ges­tion that he was be­ing moved to Agri­cul­ture, Phillip Alexan­der said he had no in­for­ma­tion to sub­stan­ti­ate it.

“I saw the doc­u­ment. I thought it was fun­ny,” Alexan­der said.

He nev­er­the­less made it clear he was pre­pared to ac­cept what­ev­er as­sign­ment Per­sad-Bisses­sar gave him.

“The Prime Min­is­ter has ab­solute au­thor­i­ty. Wher­ev­er she wants me to serve, I will serve. But I don't take on things like that be­cause I know that she plays those cards very close to her chest.”

As of yes­ter­day, there had been no of­fi­cial an­nounce­ment from the Gov­ern­ment con­firm­ing a Cab­i­net reshuf­fle.