Charles to Young: Get your facts straight

Mr. Rodney Charles
Member of Parliament
Naparima

During a TV6 interview on Thursday night the MP for Naparima, Rodney Charles, raised the issue of whether Trinidad and Tobago could afford to spend $1 billion in infrastructure to bring Venezuelan gas here since there is the possibility that the gas agreements would not be honoured in the event of a change in regime there.

“It seems as though Minister Young, in his haste to refute my statement, once again skipped over the facts. He made a similar mishap in the case of the two children who were trapped in Syria. An international human rights lawyer had to chastise him for his statements on the matter and said that he should hold his head in shame and apologise for dramatizing the efforts of the newly formed, ‘Team Nightingale,” says Charles.

During the TV6 interview Minister Young claimed, “The Prime Minister never said that the taxpayers of Trinidad and Tobago will pay a billion dollars towards the development of Dragon Field. In fact, that is not the structure of the deal whatsoever. SHELL are the ones who are going to be carrying the cost of this, we are still in the process of negotiating.”

Contrary to this, the Prime Minister in fact said during his address to the nation entitled: Mind Your Business that, “We might be asked to put up some of the money. We may have to put up, let’s say, a billion dollars in that pipeline…”

So what is the truth? What are the real arrangements in place to construct this pipeline? How can PM Rowley say one thing and his right hand man, Minister Young something else?

Clearly members of the Government need to get their stories straight.

We see it time and time again with this clueless Minister of everything but master of nothing. His approach to National Security is PR and issuing statements that are all talk no substance. Lack of performance and useless babbling has become his characteristics.

Once again Minister Young has demonstrated the incompetence of those persons currently in Government. It has become somewhat of a pattern under this Government that whenever there are major deals taking place, there tends to be a level of secrecy. The glaring lack of transparency and accountability continues to be a signature hallmark in their arrangements and governance.

True to form, whether it is Venezuela dealings or Sandals projects, citizens of T&T remain totally in the dark when it comes to this Rowley-led administration and their mystery plans.

Rodney Charles
MP for Naparima.