(PM Kamla Persad-Bissessar at her swearing-in on May 26, 2010 wearing a lime green dress)The National Lotteries Control Board (NLCB) has tried to explain its full page ad congratulating Port of Spain Mayor Louis Lee Sing.
Acting Prime Minister Winston Dookeran expressed concern about the ad in which Lee Sing, who was chairman of the NLCB during the Manning administration, is seen wearing a black PNM balisier tie.
Read the story: NCLB board under fire for ads congratulating POS mayor
NLCB Director Phyllis Borde offered an explanation for the ad, stating that there is nothing wrong in promoting someone when the person is doing something good. "We have always operated in a manner to give recognition to persons worthy of it", she explained.
Borde said she will be writing Dookeran to explain "the way things are done at the NLCB". Isn't she getting things a little upside down? I always thought the owners/shareholders - in this case the state - tell the "board" how things are done.
Why Lee Sing alone? Is she suggesting that Marlene Courdray, the new mayor of San Fernando is not worthy of the office she holds? And what about the other mayors and heads of corporations?
What is so special about Lee Singh and his balisier ties that makes him alone worthy of recognition by a state organisation that saw it fit to spend thousands of taxpayers dollars dollars on ads in the daily press?
Borde has an explanation for that too. "The NLCB does not have to congratulate everyone, and we make no apologies for congratulating Lee Sing since he has done a lot for the organisation during the time he served on our board," she said.
I beg to disagree. What he did for the board was his duty as chairman. He deserves no special treatment.
But there is also something more important.
One of the issues raised was Lee Sing's balisier tie, the official symbol of the PNM. It has always been PNM policy for its top members to wear the tie on official business.
So it is strange that Borde did not know that and even stranger that her organisation put out an ad and did not see the picture of Lee Sing and the tie. "I was at the Mayor's swearing-in ceremony and we used a photo from that," she said. Well that in itself should raise a flag that Lee Sing was wearing the tie.
I would suggest that she knew and is now trying to use spin to cover her tracks. Consider her other statement.
"We have done it in the past for several persons, including Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar wearing her beautiful yellow outfit shortly after her swearing-in ceremony, it's just what we do," Borde said.
Yellow is the colour that Persad-Bissessar used during the election campaign - a party symbol. So the insinuation is that if Kamla and her yellow dress are OK then Lee Sing and his tie should be acceptable too.
Well perhaps. Except for one significant detail.
Kamla was NOT wearing a "beautiful yellow outfit" during or shortly after her swearing-in. She was wearing a lime green dress.
She wore it when she took her oath of office; she wore it when she left immediately afterwards for a meeting with disaster preparedness officials and she wore it later in the evening at a reception at the Crowne Plaza hotel.
The Prime Minister has been very careful about party symbols and has cautioned every member of her cabinet that party symbols must be absent whenever they are on official business. And she has been very careful not to wear any political symbol on official business.So the suggestion that Kamla was wearing a "beautiful yellow dress" appears to me to be an attempt to justify the use of the other party's symbol. But worse, it's not true! It's a lie. The lady was wearing green.
The government determines policy for the NLCB and it is the government that should be telling the board "the way things are done at the NLCB".
And as a citizen I would like to hear my government tell the NCLB board that it was out of line with the ad and further, that it must stop the abuse of taxpayers funds to promote its friends.
Jai Parasram - 21 August 2010
2 comments:
Well said, Jai. I heartily concur with your commentary, here.
If this woman's bluster is not addressed by the givernment I will be most disappointed.
And as I have commented before in similar situations, just how do these various boards justify squandering public money in self aggrandisment.
I've equally rankled at entities like T&TEC running ads telling us how important they are. WTH?
What is disturbing is that the board memebers of the NLCB in their wisdom felt that Lee Sing was the right person to promote the state agency.Hence,a man who wore a tie that symbolizes inequality,racism,injustice,
corruption and two successive lickings at the polls was seen as the best way to promote the NLCB.Furthermore,the arrogance of Borde makes it clear to us all that members of the NLCB believe that they are accountable to no one.I hope Borde is brought into the loop about what change in Government means and is fired expeditiously!Our Finance Minister needs to act now!
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