An­na-Lisa Paul

It has been two-and-a-half years since Dr Kei­th Row­ley and the Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) was elect­ed to lead T&T.

How­ev­er, based on his per­for­mance up to midterm as the chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer lead­ing a 24-mem­ber min­is­te­r­i­al team, com­men­ta­tors have de­scribed Row­ley as dis­con­nect­ed, an ab­sen­tee, and some­times slow to take par­tic­u­lar ac­tion.

While one an­a­lyst not­ed the PM's di­rect steps to "cut down on ex­pen­di­ture" and "put in place aus­ter­i­ty mea­sures," he ques­tioned Row­ley's abil­i­ty to lead and in­spire the na­tion. Row­ley's per­for­mance as a leader over the last 30 months was ex­am­ined and found to be lack­ing.

'D for dis­ap­point­ment'

"There is a sense that he should con­nect more with the pop­u­la­tion in terms of the re­spons­es he gives," econ­o­mist Dr Mar­lene Attzs said. Dis­count­ing the "con­ver­sa­tions" with the pub­lic Row­ley has had over the last cou­ple months, Attzs said "There is a dis­con­nect be­tween the Prime Min­is­ter and what is ac­tu­al­ly hap­pen­ing with­in his Cab­i­net and with his gov­ern­ment min­is­ters."

How­ev­er, she was quick to point out that Row­ley's si­lence re­lat­ing to de­vel­op­ments in cer­tain sec­tors did not nec­es­sar­i­ly mean he was not hav­ing con­ver­sa­tions with the rel­e­vant min­is­ters. "It's just that he may be do­ing it qui­et­ly."

Attzs stat­ed, "If there is a pal­pa­ble sense of dis­qui­et in the coun­try and there are spe­cif­ic ar­eas peo­ple are un­com­fort­able about, crime be­ing one of them, one would ex­pect to hear the per­son in charge talk­ing about the pop­u­la­tion's un­hap­pi­ness and dis­com­fort and call­ing for a rem­e­dy in the short­est time pos­si­ble."

Ad­mit­ting dis­cus­sions may be tak­ing place away from the pub­lic's glare, Attzs said, "It is im­por­tant to hear our leader com­ing out and say­ing to the coun­try, I hear you and I am giv­ing you the as­sur­ance that I have in­struct­ed the min­is­ters to act and will re­port back to you about what we are do­ing.

"We are not hear­ing that from the Prime Min­is­ter and based on all this, I can on­ly give him a D for dis­ap­point­ment."

'He seems to be more of an ab­sen­tee PM'

Econ­o­mist In­dera Sage­wan-Al­li said Row­ley had been more of an, "Ab­sen­tee Prime Min­is­ter than a hands-on per­son who is very present and seems to be on top of every­thing, and who is lead­ing the way in terms of where and how we are to go."

She said "it is very wor­ry­ing when a Prime Min­is­ter ap­points for the third time a min­is­ter he has fired twice for him­self. It does not stack up well for him in terms of his lead­er­ship ca­pac­i­ty.

"The coun­try is not hear­ing suf­fi­cient­ly from him. Nei­ther are we see­ing him suf­fi­cient­ly nor do we have a sense that the Prime Min­is­ter re­al­ly is the per­son who is run­ning the coun­try and lead­ing us with some sense of hope."

'I ex­pect more lead­er­ship from him'

Weigh­ing in on Row­ley's per­for­mance which he de­scribed as "av­er­age", po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Win­ford James said the PM "has been very care­ful."

"He has been some­times slow to take par­tic­u­lar ac­tion. He has not been ad­ven­tur­ous and he has giv­en him­self cer­tain pri­or­i­ties. His job is to keep the ship afloat, man­ag­ing how he spends. He has tak­en ac­tion to cut down on ex­pen­di­ture and he has put in place aus­ter­i­ty mea­sures." The im­ple­men­ta­tion of the amend­ed prop­er­ty tax re­mains a source of dis­tress for the pop­u­la­tion.

Voic­ing con­cerns about Row­ley's abil­i­ty to lead, James asked, "Is he in­spir­ing the na­tion?"

Chal­lenged to an­swer his own ques­tion, James can­did­ly replied, "I don't think so. I think he's so con­sumed by the right­ness of his po­si­tion that I don't know if he ac­cepts that he is not lead­ing in the way that he should."

James de­clared Row­ley had failed "calami­tous­ly" in ad­dress­ing To­ba­go and the re­sul­tant is­sues on the air and sea-bridge.

"I ex­pect and ex­pect­ed more lead­er­ship from him," James added.