DA­REECE PO­LO

Se­nior Re­porter

da­reece.po­lo@guardian.co.tt

For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers has voiced strong con­cern over Venezuela’s de­ci­sion to de­clare Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar “per­sona non gra­ta,” con­firm­ing he raised the is­sue di­rect­ly with Venezuela’s Am­bas­sador to T&T.

In a tele­phone in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Sobers said he con­tact­ed Am­bas­sador Ál­varo En­rique Sánchez Cordero fol­low­ing Tues­day’s vote in the Venezue­lan Na­tion­al As­sem­bly.

“The con­ver­sa­tion was cor­dial,” Sobers said. “But I did ex­press, on be­half of the gov­ern­ment, our deep con­cern and grave dis­ap­point­ment with the As­sem­bly’s po­si­tion on the res­o­lu­tion.”

The move has sparked re­ac­tions across T&T’s po­lit­i­cal spec­trum, with some ral­ly­ing be­hind the Prime Min­is­ter and oth­ers urg­ing re­straint.

While Sobers’ tone was mea­sured, Par­lia­men­tary Sec­re­tary in the Min­istry of Sport and Youth Af­fairs, David Nakhid, was far more di­rect, dis­miss­ing Venezuela’s de­c­la­ra­tion.

“Venezuela could do what they want. For us, she is all ‘gra­ta’,” he said out­side Par­lia­ment on yes­ter­day.

Nakhid de­fend­ed Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s record, cit­ing her com­mit­ment to na­tion­al safe­ty and her will­ing­ness to con­front drug car­tel threats. He al­so crit­i­cised the Op­po­si­tion, ac­cus­ing the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) of dou­ble stan­dards.

“That is why I re­fer to the PNM lead­er­ship as ra­bid dogs when they are not in gov­ern­ment. They will do any­thing to re­turn to pow­er,” he said, prompt­ing an im­me­di­ate back­lash from the Op­po­si­tion.

Sen­a­tor Faris Al-Rawi re­spond­ed, say­ing Nakhid’s out­burst added no val­ue to the na­tion­al con­ver­sa­tion.

“There’s noth­ing of worth com­ing out of his con­tri­bu­tions. That is not the kind of talk­ing head you want in this equa­tion,” Al-Rawi said, shift­ing at­ten­tion to En­er­gy Min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mooni­lal.

Mean­while, oth­er min­is­ters re­mained large­ly silent. Anil Roberts de­clined to com­ment, while Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Hous­ing Phillip Ed­ward Alexan­der echoed the Prime Min­is­ter’s ear­li­er re­marks, stat­ing he sup­ports her de­ci­sion not to vis­it Venezuela amid its mass ex­o­dus of cit­i­zens.

In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor An­tho­ny Vieira, SC, urged cau­tion as ten­sions rise.

“For the mo­ment, I would pre­fer to make no com­ment. It’s all very un­for­tu­nate and I hope things will sort them­selves out in due course,” Vieira said.

Po­lit­i­cal an­a­lysts are split on the po­ten­tial fall­out. Derek Ram­samooj warned that the stand­off could af­fect fu­ture ne­go­ti­a­tions on en­er­gy and bor­der is­sues un­less both sides take steps to mend re­la­tions.

“A strate­gic re­set is need­ed if we are to ben­e­fit from the re­sources of both coun­tries,” he said.

Po­lit­i­cal sci­en­tist Dr Bish­nu Ra­goonath, how­ev­er, de­scribed the de­c­la­ra­tion as large­ly sym­bol­ic.

“It has no re­al im­pact. Es­sen­tial­ly, the Venezue­lan gov­ern­ment is say­ing they don’t want her in their coun­try, but no sanc­tions have been im­posed,” he ex­plained.

Be­lize calls for calm

Amid grow­ing re­gion­al con­cern, Be­lize Prime Min­is­ter John An­to­nio Briceño has ap­pealed for re­straint, warn­ing that the es­ca­lat­ing dis­pute be­tween Venezuela and T&T could desta­bilise the wider Caribbean.

“We look at the Caribbean as a zone of peace. We need to do every­thing to keep it that way,” Briceño said. “Venezuela has been a part­ner, and Trinidad and To­ba­go is a Cari­com mem­ber. We hope to tone down the rhetoric and avoid talk of in­va­sion.”

Briceño al­so con­demned the re­cent killings of men aboard fish­ing ves­sels, not­ing that while the boats may or may not have been trans­port­ing drugs, the loss of life was un­ac­cept­able.

He spoke to re­porters in Be­lize yes­ter­day.