Dr. Rowley: Commonwealth Celebrates Jindal, While UNC 'Louts' Attack

Trinidad and Tobago, take a close look at these pictures and this situation, then use your own common sense and tell me what you see.

I am at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Apia, Samoa where I just had the pleasure of sitting at a table dining with King Charles III, Head of the Commonwealth, King Mswati of Eswatini, Prime Minister Mia Mottley and President Irfaan Ali.

A few hours earlier at a working session this afternoon, we received the Report of Secretary-General Baroness Patricia Scotland. Inside the back cover page of this document is a photograph that has been received, without murmur, by 56 Commonwealth countries, represented by their Kings, Prime Ministers and other Leaders.

The pride of place given to this photograph is where O.P. Jindal Global University, New Delhi is featured as described in the caption.

Isn’t it ironic that at the same time almost to the hour, that Mr Jindal is presented to the Commonwealth in this way, he is being excoriated and slandered in the Trinidad and Tobago Parliament by the UNC, led by the usual suspects Wade Mark and Kamla Persad-Bissessar!

What is Mr Jindal’s crime that makes him and his company so offensive to the UNC and their followers? He, one of the richest men in India, brought one of the biggest industrial businesses to Trinidad to take a look at our refinery (mothballed since 2018) with a view to making a $500 Million USD investment to get the refinery up and running again under new arrangements that ought not to threaten to bankrupt the country and in whose hands an adequate supply of crude would have been made available.

Any right-thinking citizen should want this done and encourage the interest shown by this giant Indian company.

No, not the UNC. When I tell you all that these are the most destructive, unpatriotic louts amongst us, you all don’t believe me. All they are concerned about is political power to clean out the treasury.

Elections. Elections is their mantra.

How did Mr Jindal end up in the UNC crosshairs? As Prime Minister, I paid a visit to India at the invitation of Reliance, another Indian giant company. I took the opportunity, whilst there, to address a sizable group of businessmen containing a range of business interests, arranged by our High Commissioner Gopaul in India and some of the contacts that he had made whilst doing his job.

A group of these businessmen on hearing about Trinidad and Tobago, in the way that I sold us to them, got excited and immediately organized a delegation to Trinidad and Tobago on an exploratory visit.

It was they who contacted their associate of the Jindal Group. They found out that Mr Jindal was in Venezuela and invited him to join them in a visit to Trinidad where the Prime Minister has said there is opportunity for foreign investment in a number of areas, the most conspicuous being the mothballed refinery.

Mr Jindal could not wait in South America until the group from India arrived but wanting to be a part of their interest and enthusiasm asked my office whether he could come ahead of them to see the refinery. The answer was yes.

He flew in immediately to Trinidad under the guidance and with the assistance of our Foreign Ministry. Once this trip was confirmed he asked whether he could pay a courtesy call on the Prime Minister.

I agreed to see him as an act of encouragement, the same way I did with all the others at the Taj Hotel in Mumbai, India.

He paid a courtesy call for a few minutes and proceeded to put his technical people to work visiting the Guaracara data room in preparation for his group to put in a major proposal on the refinery restart operations.

Eh heh! Who tell he to do that?

The UNC heard about that. The last thing these miscreants want is for that refinery to be up and running! They don’t want that to happen! They want to have it there in its current state so that they could try to score political points by attacking the PNM by frequently mentioning its existence even when it doesn’t make sense (David Lee stump speech).

What they fail to realize is that the PNM is quite satisfied that we have fixed a problem at Petrotrin. Heritage is up and running successfully and profitably paying billions in taxes and servicing the Petrotrin $850million USD debt that threatened to bankrupt the country if the Minister of Finance had to take it over.

Paria is up and running and making a tidy profit. We were never short of refined fuel for one day since the restructuring and the Ministry of Finance is servicing a separate $450 million legacy debt of Petrotrin whilst this latter company is now a holding company with profitable subsidiaries.

That is how serious, sensible governments solve a problem. All that was left was the retired refinery temporary or permanent, we don’t know, but what we do know is that unless there is an investor willing to fund the restart and fund a supply of crude the refinery is not a good business for the taxpayers to re-enter.

So back to Mr Jindal, what is his crime?

He talked to the Prime Minister! His people were in the data room when the UNC leadership launched a scorching campaign against him and his company. They knew, and their imps in Tobago, that like Sandals, these are family businesses, owned and run by people who will shy far away from unwarranted slanderous attacks so they go full speed ahead hoping to obstruct progress.

Well they have succeeded. We have to be the most squeaky clean country where a company like the Jindal Group which is among the wealthiest, most successful of businesses in India, a major Commonwealth country, operating all over the world, is welcomed by the Commonwealth Secretariat but not approved by the UNC who only see “scandal”.

What is the scandal? Wade Mark has done research.

David Lee, charged, and $1million bail is chasing away Jindal from Pointe-a-Pierre where he is the sitting MP.

This has to be madness but it is not. It is pure selfish, unpatriotic politics! The UNC will always give up a chance for success for this country in order to give themselves a chance to succeed in the political arena.

One only has to look at their posture and behavior with the government’s efforts to get gas from Venezuelan fields. They hate the “Dragon Deal” more than they hate human trafficking even though both involve the same Venezuela. Today I look at this picture as it was presented here in Samoa and I feel sad that my own people could be so wicked to our own people.

Do you know what $500 million USD at Pointe-a-Pierre would have done for thousands of people, individuals and businesses, in what they call, “fence line” communities, as if they care about them?

They only care about themselves and they are only concerned about elections. Look at the picture, think about the refinery and The Jindal Group and tell me what you think.

Source / Credit:

Dr Keith Rowley