Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley’s 45-year po­lit­i­cal ca­reer has failed to leave a last­ing lega­cy in To­ba­go, Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine said yes­ter­day as he re­act­ed to the an­nounce­ment of Dr Row­ley’s re­tire­ment from pol­i­tics.

Au­gus­tine, while not­ing the per­son­al sac­ri­fices of pub­lic life, crit­i­cised Row­ley’s han­dling of To­ba­go’s au­ton­o­my and his over­all lega­cy as Prime Min­is­ter.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia in a sit-down in­ter­view, he said, “Per­haps the Prime Min­is­ter and I will re­main life­long po­lit­i­cal en­e­mies. But cer­tain­ly, hav­ing been in pol­i­tics since 2017, I un­der­stand how much pub­lic ser­vice at this lev­el takes from the in­di­vid­ual, takes from the fam­i­ly. And cer­tain­ly, I’m sure his fam­i­ly will be hap­py to have him home, and I wish him noth­ing but the best in his fu­ture en­deav­ours.”

How­ev­er, Au­gus­tine did not hold back in cri­tiquing Dr Row­ley’s lead­er­ship, par­tic­u­lar­ly re­gard­ing To­ba­go’s push for au­ton­o­my.

“That does not stop To­ba­go’s quest for au­ton­o­my at all,” he said, be­fore adding, “It will hap­pen one day. It did not hap­pen on Dr Row­ley’s tenure, and per­haps it’s be­cause of how he han­dled it and his view­point and his de­sire to force on the is­land what he want­ed in terms of the gov­er­nance struc­ture as op­posed to what the peo­ple of To­ba­go want­ed. Notwith­stand­ing, with or with­out him, it will hap­pen. It’s just not one of his lega­cies.”

Re­flect­ing on the broad­er im­pact of Row­ley’s lead­er­ship, Au­gus­tine claimed To­ba­go had been ne­glect­ed.

“We cer­tain­ly feel ag­griev­ed by some of the de­ci­sions he and PNM made,” Au­gus­tine said.

“We cer­tain­ly feel that the best in­ter­est of To­ba­go was not al­ways with­in sight of his lead­er­ship. But notwith­stand­ing all of that, I think the most ap­pro­pri­ate thing to do at this time is to wish him noth­ing but the ab­solute best, that he will have good health go­ing for­ward, that his fam­i­ly will en­joy hav­ing him around more of­ten. Be­cause I do ap­pre­ci­ate, dif­fer­ences aside, what this job takes from the in­di­vid­ual and takes from your fam­i­lies.”

Au­gus­tine al­so framed the up­com­ing elec­tion as a chance for vot­ers to as­sess Row­ley’s time in of­fice.

“This elec­tion is re­al­ly about Dr Row­ley’s lega­cy,” he said. “He es­sen­tial­ly has served for ten years, and so we are all be­ing asked to go to the polls and to give a judge­ment on whether or not he did a good job as prime min­is­ter. And for us in the TPP, the an­swer to that ques­tion is a re­sound­ing ‘no”. That’s how we are go­ing to en­cour­age To­bag­o­ni­ans to vote.”

De­spite his crit­i­cisms, Au­gus­tine bid his farewell on a more com­pas­sion­ate note.

“I was look­ing for­ward to do­ing po­lit­i­cal bat­tle with him in the up­com­ing elec­tion. I did so in 2021, and we beat him re­sound­ing­ly, so I was look­ing for­ward to do­ing that again in 2025. Notwith­stand­ing that, I don’t have pos­i­tive feel­ings to­wards the out­go­ing Prime Min­is­ter’s lega­cy. Oth­ers may have pos­i­tive feel­ings to­wards his lega­cy. I don’t, but at the end of the day, his­to­ry will be the ul­ti­mate judge of all of us, and that in­cludes me.”

Duke: Give him his flow­ers

Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) leader Wat­son Duke had a more diplo­mat­ic tone, con­grat­u­lat­ing Row­ley on his long ca­reer and grace­ful ex­it from pol­i­tics.

“The Prime Min­is­ter, Dr Kei­th Christo­pher Row­ley, has served for 45 years. He has been prime min­is­ter for al­most ten years.

“Dur­ing that time, he has had many vic­to­ries, some loss­es, made en­e­mies, and made friends. As the po­lit­i­cal leader of the PDP, I want to say con­grat­u­la­tions to him. He has done all that he could do, and now he knows it’s time to leave.”

Duke said Row­ley’s tenure was not with­out short­com­ings.

“The things he didn’t ac­com­plish were prob­a­bly be­yond his abil­i­ty to do,” Duke not­ed.

“But I com­mend him for recog­nis­ing when it’s time to step aside. That’s an im­por­tant les­son for all lead­ers.”

Urg­ing oth­ers to re­spect Row­ley’s de­ci­sion, Duke added, “Let’s bring the cur­tains down on this chap­ter. Let’s give him his flow­ers, thank him for his ser­vice, and bid him good­bye from po­lit­i­cal life. I wish him all the best in this next phase of his life.”