SCARBOROUGH, Tobago – The Chief Secretary of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA), Farley Augustine, Monday described as “inconsequential nonsense” the amendments which the government tabled in the Parliament regarding the legislation for the autonomy of Tobago.
THA Chief Secretary, Farley Augustine (File Photo)“In 2021, Tobagonians told them to take out that Premier title and revert to Chief Secretary. Today they went back to 2020 and spent time on the most basic and really unimportant change while refusing to treat with important matters,” Augustine said in a message posted on Facebook.
Earlier, the main opposition United National Congress (UNC) used its numbers in the Parliament to prevent the government from pushing ahead with the legislation regarding the granting of autonomy to Tobago.
Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley had sought to get approval for the reading of legislation to amend the Trinidad and Tobago Constitution “to accord self government to Tobago and for related matters be forthwith read a third time an passed”.
Speaker Bridgid Annisette-George told legislators that the bill required a three-fourth special majority and when the matter was put to the vote 21 government legislators voted n favour while 16 opposition members voted against the move.
“Honourable members with a division of 21 members voting for, 16 members voting against and no abstention, the motion for the third reading of the Constitutional Amendment Tobago Self Government Bill 2020 is not approved,” Annisette-George said to loud applause from the opposition benches.
In his Facebook page, Augustine said that the government had failed to deal with matters such as creating a real Federal type system, defining and delineating the boundaries of the island of Tobago as well as creating equality of status between the two main islands and enshrining the rights of Tobago to pass laws over all the matters that affect the lives of the people of Tobago among others.
Senator Ancil Dennis
“Really? Of all the concerns Tobagonians have, the most important thing is a title? That is majoring in the minors,” Augustine wrote after posting the proposed amendments to the Autonomy Bills on social media.
“Nothing is worse than when your relative who is in the seat of power, is nothing but a house slave that ignores the real dreams and aspirations of those he left behind in the field in Tobago,” Augustine wrote, concluding with the hashtags: #HouseSlaveMentality #WickedPM.
In an earlier statement, Augustine said clause eight of the Constitution (Amendment Bill), although providing law-making power, is listed in a schedule attached to the companion legislation, the Tobago Island Government Bill (TIG).
“The people of Tobago are of the view that these matters should be entrenched in the Constitution. Placing them in the TIG has the effect of making the laws passed by the TIG subordinate to national laws. Consequently, making them inferior and not of equal status.”
But the leader of the Tobago Council of the ruling People’s National Movement (PNM), Ancil Dennis, slammed Augustine and the UNC of engaging in political gamesmanship by using amendments suggested by the THA Chief Secretary to criticise the bills.
“What we had for the entire committee process today was blatant game-playing and references to Farley’s jokey amendments dispatched via WhatsApp this morning. They could not put Tobago’s business before their own narrow political interest.”
Dennis, a government senator, said the actions of the UNC and Augustine, reminded him of a situation in 1996, when former prime minister and president, ANR Robinson, was only able to get “from his then UNC friends and partners in government…an arrangement that inflicted complete Cabinet control upon Tobago, to the extent that we cannot even now pass a law for Tobago.
“We will continue to exist and operate in Tobago under the limited provisions of the current THA Act 40 of 1996,” he said, adding that Tobago’s budget will continue to be limited to TT$2.5 billion (One TT dollar=US$0.16 cents) and not over four billion dollars.
The autonomy bill had proposed Tobago receive a minimum 6.8 per cent of the national budget, instead of the minimum 4.03 per cent as recommended by the Dispute Resolution Commission in 2000.
“The effect of this is that we continue to have a THA legislature with zero law-making powers, and matters requiring legislative intervention will continue to languish. I do not know if in my lifetime another opportunity will arise to fix this long-standing impropriety, but what I do know is that this is a sad day for Tobago and Tobagonians,” Dennis said.
The two Tobago bill had been on the Order Paper since 2021 and had also been the subject of a joint committee of Parliament as well with the Leader of the Government Business, Camille Robinson-Regis, indicating that the bills would come before the committee stage where they would be examined clause by clause.
Prime Minister Rowley described as “preposterous” the efforts of the opposition to prevent the exercise from going forward based on concerns they said had been raised by Augustine.
“Nothing has come to me from the Chief Secretary’s office, but today in the Parliament, one minute before we seat to deal with in a committee stage of a joint select committee of years of work, this (opposition) member comes here facilitating this intervention by a WhatsApp by amendments being proposed by the Tobago House of Assembly through its chief secretary.
“Madam Speaker, this is preposterous and I will have none of it,” Rowley added.
In the end , the opposition voted against both the Tobago Island Government Bill 2021, as it did with regards to the Constitutional Amendment Tobago Self Government Bill 2020 bill in the committee stages even as the government moved to amended certain clauses.
