PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC—Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley says a national consultation on constitutional reform will be held in October this year, dismissing the opposition suggestion of an early general election in Trinidad and Tobago.
Addressing a special convention of the ruling People’s National Movement (PNM) on Sunday night, Rowley also announced plans to remove the three ships of Christopher Columbus from Trinidad and Tobago’s coat of arms and replace them with the national instrument, the steelpan.
He told the convention that the change is expected to be finalized before Republic Day on September 24, with a six-month transition period to facilitate changes to stationery and other official materials.
“I want to appeal to my parliamentary colleagues and those with political aspirations. There are times when they’ve got to come together, and now is one of those times,” Rowley said in an apparent reference to Opposition Leader Kamala Persad Bissessar’s statement that constitutional reform is a political gimmick by the ruling party.
“The entire constitutional reform is another election gimmick. This is the same tired PNM gimmickry that was used before, as seen in the local government reform charade in 2023 and the roadmap to recovery propaganda before the general election 2020, where they duped gullible pseudo-intellectuals and some business persons,” Persad-Bissessar told the Trinidad Guardian newspaper over the last weekend.
“This reform report is just a con job to be used as the PNM manifesto for the upcoming general election. Ninety-nine percent of the population saw it as a propaganda ploy, and it was very poorly attended; not even PNM supporters took it seriously or attended. The committee comprised persons unqualified for the task and were met with mostly empty rooms throughout the country in their consultations,” she added.
But Rowley said that the national conference on constitutional reform will most likely occur in the first week of October, adding, “That guarantees you that the election they’re talking about in November will not take place.
“And to say that we are doing it because it’s election time, I told you early on, the work I did to get to this point took place in 2023, and in January 2024, the committee was appointed. January 2024 is the middle of the term of 2025 because we lost 2021 into 2022 with COVID-19.
“We were recovering from COVID (and)….this is one issue we didn’t leave behind. And therefore, it is nonsense to say that this has anything to do with some political election. That is, there will be no election in November.
“There will be an election in 2025, but in the meantime, this exercise is so important that we should follow it step by step, and as the song says in prayer, it will lead us to a place. It will lead us to a place if we abandon the exercise for whatever reason because we get weary or it’s undermined politically. We will not get there.
“But if we stay with the exercise, those irritants, those fundamental obstacles, we as a people, …as a nation should be able to come up with a package of reform that we have some general agreement on, because we are not going to get agreement on everything, and not everybody going to agree with any one thing.”
Rowley told the convention that he is aiming for consensus, acknowledging that what “you going to get is probably widespread support or significant opposition, and that is where leadership comes in.
“What do we go forward with as leaders of this country? We have a PNM. We are sufficiently important that we should not be ignored, but we are sufficiently responsible not to forgive anybody. We are adequately experienced in not being disrespected and will not disrespect anyone.
“We welcome the rest of the nation in this exercise, and if the PNM has to lead it, it is because we are the government. There are some things the government has to do, and because we have been in government in this country, from 56 to 86, from 91 to 95 from 2002 to 2010 and from 2015, to wherever,” he added.
“We are responsible for this exercise, and it’s an exercise where we aim to bring about change, and what we genuinely want is not exchange. We want fundamental, useful, beneficial change, and the consultative process has and will continue to play its role,” he said.
He said opposition antics have also held up the situation regarding Tobago’s call for greater autonomy.
“The issue of Tobago in the Constitution has been with us for quite some time, since 1970, and several adjustments have been made. Several positions have been taken. We ended up with a Tobago Assembly 10 years later, in 1980, and then we amended it again later, and now, after that second amendment, there was widespread consultation in Tobago. “
Rowley said that the bill before Parliament on Tobago followed widespread consultation on the sister island and was brought to the legislative chambers by his administration “without amending” a thing.
He said that arising out of the Tobago situation, a Joint Select Committee of Parliament was established and put to work on the Tobago issue because, at that time, the amendment to the Constitution on that situation was about only Tobago.
“What we have done here today is to broaden that exercise for the whole country, Trinidad and Tobago. That’s what it is. The joint select committee reported some very far-reaching improvements towards granting Tobago greater autonomy over the business, the resources, the vision, and the future of Tobago.
“That’s in the outcome of the joint select committee report. So far, only the PNM supports that initiative…It does not have the support of the UNC (United National Congress), but we always believe that somewhere, sometime, come along and come to a consensus.
Rowley said the government had kept the Tobago issue alive in the Parliament, and “I have seen nothing better and nothing to replace it, so I’m going to put it to the floor in the Parliament for a vote. When it goes to the Parliament, it will be the first arm of this constitutional reform exercise that will be tested by the people of Trinidad and Tobago.
“It doesn’t have to be a perfect bill. There’s no such thing as a perfect bill. We’ve passed many laws in the Parliament, and within three to six months, we’ve come back to the Parliament to tweak it and to amend it, for good reason.
“So the Tobago select committee report that gives Tobago a lot, much more than anyone to provide you with when you put it there, the votes of the PNM are guaranteed it is supported. The others in the Parliament will be invited to support it, and abstention will not be a way out because not casting a vote for it means abstaining because it requires their support.
“And as for politicians in Tobago, when we put it on the floor in the Parliament, then you will see who your friends are and who are the ones who don’t want Tobago to get any aspect of improvement on the current laws teaching directly, as simple as that, it will not die and lapse in the Parliament,” Rowley said, adding “if it dies in the Parliament, it would be because I’ve been voted down.
“So … the vote will take place on the Tobago joint committee report,” he said.
Rowley said that the three Columbus boats in the Trinidad and Tobago emblem would be replaced, “and since we have enough votes in the Parliament to do it, I can announce now that as soon as the legislature adjustment is made, and that amendment, that adjustment should be made before the 24th of September, we then, over six months, we replace Columbus three ships, the Santa Maria, The Pinta, and the Nina, with the steel band”.
He said replacing the ships on the emblem should signal that “we are on our way to removing the colonial relics in our Constitution.
“And I hope that we start with that, and we end up getting up and no longer being squatters on the steps of the Privy Council because all those who believe, all those who think that the Privy Council must always be our Supreme Court, one of these days in England, there’s going to be a government that will take the position to expel us, and then we leave.
“If we have our tails, we put it between our legs and agree. Ladies and gentlemen, we should have done that since 2025. This is an exciting exercise, and it will do us well to see through,” Rowley said after telling the convention the PNM’s position on the CCJ, which was established in 2001 as the region’s highest and final court, is well-known.
“Everybody knows that the PNM position on the CCJ is that we prefer to complete our independence. And as the President of India told us here in Trinidad and Tobago, when they adjust the Parliament, the Supreme Court of India is supreme in India.
“We want the Supreme Court of Trinidad and Tobago to be supreme, and what is it that we have other CARICOM colleagues who are comfortable in their situation where CCJ is their court.”
Rowley said it is ironic that the CCJ’s headquarters are based in Trinidad and Tobago, a country that is not a full member.
“Political decisions derail that, and we have the embarrassment of the court being located here, but we do not have it as our final court of appeal. I really would like to say today it would be a great satisfaction to me if the Opposition Leader would change her position and allow her people, if not her since she’s not interested… allow her people, to take part in these proceedings so that the national interest can be served,” Rowley said, also referring to changes to the policies regarding the establishment of service commissions.
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