Chaguanas West MP has dubbed Prime Minister Patrick Manning as a man of contradictions for telling the United Nations General Assembly one thing and the people of Trinidad and Tobago another.The opposition foreign affairs critic made the comment in reference to Manning's address to the 64th General Assembly Saturday in New York.
Manning told the world body, “We must be very wary of the level of adventurousness in leading financial institutions, which contributed very significantly to driving the world to the edge of an economic precipice, from which we are just starting to pull back."
Read the story: Manning tells UN crime is linked to economic crisis
In a news release, Warner said Manning's admission is "a masterpiece of a contradiction as mere weeks ago his Government in its Budget presentation, turned its back on the “level of adventurousness” and continued in a flippant and frivolous dispensation of the public’s purse".
Warner observed that the 2010 budget bore no resemblance to a “watchful” financial approach that he advocated before the world body.
"In that budget, a total package of 46.4 billion TT dollars, the Prime Minister, through his Minister of Finance, threw caution to the wind in announcing a continuation of ostentatious projects, grandiose skyscrapers and pretentious and pompous infrastructural works," Warner noted.
He said despite warnings about the need "to curb the brazen abuse of the treasury" Manning's finance minister announced massive spending.
"His advice therefore, to the UN and on the need to be wary still of the financial times, mere weeks after his lavish budget at home, must be listed as the consummate economic paradox.
"Manning’s inconsistency even borders on political schizophrenia; saying one thing at home and another thing abroad," Warner said.
Commenting on Manning's rhetorical question to the UN: "How many more dreams must now, once again, be deferred?" Warner wondered why Manning never thought of posing that question at home.
"How many dreams of homeowners have been deferred by a vicious and draconian property tax regime? How many dreams of the working class have been smashed by failure to address the minimum wage?
"How many dreams of the former sugar workers have been shattered by failure to ensure that lands are given to them? How many dreams of an entire nation have been squashed by not dealing with crime, poverty and unemployment?" Warner asked.
"These dreams and aspirations would one day find true realization under a new political dispensation. The nation cries for it. The country begs for it. Manning denies it," Warner concluded.
Warner also took the prime minister to task for his statement on crime. Manning attributed crime to the loss of preferential markets for sugar and banana.
The MP called that "an absolute and unconditional untruth, fabrication and political invention. It is the most nefarious and despicable fabrication of the truth and yet another feeble attempt by the Government to shift responsibility and deflect from national attention."
Warner noted that an analysis of crime statistics in Trinidad and Tobago suggests that the majority of crimes, particularly murders, are the result of drug and criminal gang activity and that these crimes are concentrated mainly along the East-West Corridor.
"Any study would reveal that these citizens who have been under the siege of the drug trade and criminal gangs were not the persons who were displaced by the sugar and banana industries. They were in fact, socially and politically oppressed by the PNM for decades," he said.
Warner said the real reason behind the continuance of the drug trade and criminal gangs is "the mismanagement of the affairs of the people; the wastage of over $20 billion by the Minister of National Security over the last seven years; and the refusal of the Prime Minister and the Government to stop cuddling and befriending criminal elements."
He was adamant that the contribution of the decline of the sugar cane industry pales in comparison to "the deliberate incompetence of the Government in dealing with crime and their refusal to provide the police with basic, modern tools and resources to protect the people."
The Prime Minister’s address to the UN was a blatant attempt to shift responsibility from himself and his incompetent Government, Warner said.
"He must not escape the public’s scrutiny on this barefaced untruth and falsehood. He must stop speaking untruths and placing blame on the innocent, oppressed people of Trinidad and Tobago for his own misconduct and maladministration."
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