Letter: I'm depending on you for closure, Dr Rowley

Timothy Hamel-Smith

If I had any clout, the entire statement issued by His Excellency, the President (Acting) of Trinidad and Tobago, Timothy Hamel-Smith, would have been plastered on the front page of every newspaper today, verbatim, reason being: this is no time to spin, but to let the public have full access to the insight of every public figure who demonstrates what Nature did instil in every living created: those who cannot put their errors behind them or learn from them, quickly becomeirrelevant, then, as time marches on, utterly extinct.

I therefore wish to commend His Excellency (Acting) for his forthright and honest statement on the Section 34 fiasco. He apologised for having allowed this "fundamentally flawed" legislation to be passed under his watch and said he felt a sense of "personal responsibility".

Mr Hamel Smith was the President of the Senate and the Chairman of the Select Committee that would have considered this law clause by clause. He is therefore correct to acknowledge his role and assume personal responsibility for what transpired under his watch.

In light of this admission, I must however ask whether Dr Rowley, or David Abdulah (who also voted for Section 34), would now be demanding Mr. Hamel-Smith's resignation from the Senate? For the Acting President has pointed a finger at the entire Parliament and this supports the Attorney General's contention that it was a collective parliamentary miscue as opposed to a grand conspiracy by the Government alone.

Let us therefore, in light of His Excellency's statement, accept that all our Parliamentarians must share the blame and put this sordid affair to one side and move on to the more critical issues such as the need to reduce crime, or improve health care services and our built infrastructure (especially motorways and drainage) and, most of all, public sector reform. Leslie Mouttet | St Lucien Road, Diego Martin, Trinidad