PNM wants PP gov't to reconsider smelter project

The opposition People’s National Movement (PNM) is suggesting that the government's decision to scrap the Alutrint Smelter in La Brea could hurt Trinidad and Tobago's international credibility because investor confidence may decline.

Vice-Chairman John Donaldson made the comment to reporters Saturday following a meeting of the PNM's General Council at the party's Balisier House headquarters.

Donaldson called on Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar to rethink the decision, noting that the government's policy on this issue would negatively affect the country’s business climate.

On Wednesday budget Finance Minister Winston Dookeran announced the cancellation of the Alutrint Smelter project commissioned by the Manning administration. Dookeran said the government would put an alternative strategy in place for La Brea.

Donaldson said that development has caused concern. “The general council has thrown its full support behind the smelter plant. A plant which the people of La Brea, Fyzabad, Point Fortin, the whole Peninsula had great hope in.

“It seems that this hope many thousands of people held for a long time has disappeared with the suggestion that this would not longer take place.

“Concern was raised as to how the other states—China, Brazil and Venezuela—that participated in this very important project (would react), so that our international affairs would be impacted, not to mention of course investor confidence.

"If they chose to invest in T&T, in the back of their minds perhaps is that at some point in time things could happen which should not happen in a manner in which it happened in respect of the Alutrint Smelter.”