It strikes me as bizarre the way the PP government seem to have no concept of how to project this country to overseas investors.
The Caribbean Investment Forum on monday and tuesday displayed all that is good and vibrant in T&T. An excellent forum attended by business leaders from across the region. Beutifully arranged and orchestrated, it projected T&T as a business leader, not just in the Caribbean, but also across Central, and Northern South America.
Yet within 48 hours of this event, Jack Warner is acting P.M. Leaving any personal feelings out of this, how must this appear to international political and business leaders? We currently are undergoing shocking revelations in the HCU enquiry, have suffered similar in the CLICO enquiry, we have the Calder Hart scandal hovering over us and a murder rate 20 times that of the U.K.
All of that is bad enough, and at least the govt can protest that all of this is in the past and things will be different. But by honouring Warner with the acting P.M., the govt is also expressing that the nation has not learned. Basic research into Warner will see that he's currently involved in scandals concerning over $200 million of questionable financial dealing.
Aside from the non payment of a US$750k FIFA fine from 2006, there is the missing TT$80 million missing from the LOC2006 accounts, the missing donation to Haiti, the bribery allegations currently in front of FIFA and an ongoing court case concerning around TT$38 million surrounding construction of the Emerald Hotel.
Innocent until proven guilty is of course the mantra we should follow. But when you are trying to build an international reputation as a solid, trustworthy business partner, you really have to consider how the nation is viewed from outside.
In my opinion, the timing of this temporary "promotion" is very poor and detracts from all of the great work being done by people like Stephen Cadiz to uplift T&T's reputation.