Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: The best insight, instant feedback, accountability. The all new Talk Radio Freedom 106.5. Now it's time to turn our attention to what's taking place in the island of Tobago, our sister isle. And we have chatting with this morning, Dr. James as we spotlight the Tobago's economy.
Good Morning to you, Dr. James. Morning.
[00:00:23] Speaker B: Morning. Morning. How are you?
[00:00:25] Speaker A: I am all right. Glad to have you this morning.
How was Tobago today, sir? I mean it's raining in Trinidad. How was the weather across on your island?
[00:00:33] Speaker B: Beautiful and sunny where I am.
[00:00:36] Speaker A: Well, lucky you. Send some of that sunshine over here to Mina, man.
[00:00:40] Speaker B: All right, send some to this side.
[00:00:43] Speaker A: As we get set this morning to progress deal with what is happening on the political landscape. It has been a resounding defeat for the PNM in Tobago. The Tobagonians have spoken Fali Agustin and the TPP seems to be the party of choice that the Tobagonians believe would lead them going forward.
What is the consensus of the island? What are you getting coming out of the Tobago House of Assembly? What is the leader of that party, Falia Gusting, looking to see with the two seats when it comes to parliament?
Is he planning to align with the government or sit in the opposition benches?
[00:01:26] Speaker B: Well, you'll have to ask him those questions. But the record suggests only what you might think of as a partial consensus because you have in the elections well below the last tha elections, for example, and effectively a minority of the population in Tobago provided the winning team.
So what you're going to do with that in a context in which you can understand why a minority of the society came out is a big question. I mean, let me point out the record.
You in Trinidad remove the PNM from office because there was a 23% decline in the living standards of the country from 2015 to 2024.
You should know that the same thing happened in Tobago and a big chunk of that happened on the valley.
So there is a kind of paradox in the air is in the sense that even though there was an economic collapse in Tobago too, what you would observe is that Tobago joined the national consensus to remove the PNM from office. With justification, I would say. But where we go from here is a huge question.
[00:02:56] Speaker A: What are the persons on the island in terms of businesses, even the tourism sector? What are they hoping would take place in the coming months as it relates to the the Tobago People's Party leader, Farley Augustine, what is the general consensus where the economy is being questioned at this time?
[00:03:15] Speaker B: Well, he promised in his victory speech that he would try to do better.
That's assuming an understanding of why we didn't do well in the first place.
But that was the promise and I would imagine that's what his supporters believe.
Whether you can do better in the context in which you are operating in Tobago is a whole different story. You want to remember that in the swearing in on Saturday, the ministers and the prime minister before that committed to upholding the constitution and the law, the very constitution we have to change if we are going to make any progress whatsoever.
And the very law, the tha act that you're going to have to reform dramatically, drastically if you're going to make any form of economic progress both in Trinidad and in Tobago. The lessons of the Rawleigh should be a huge lesson for the country. As the lesson for the last 69 years. The common context for the 69 years has been an authoritarian government.
Different leaders expected that every turn, every time they took power. Remember Robinson, remember Manning, remember Kamala herself, Rowley. Every time they took power, the commitment was to do better.
The commitment was to undo the wrongs of the previous government and so on. And in every instance up until now, they have failed. And the fundamental reason for the failure is the way the country is set up. It's not set up for economic progress.
So if you're going to fix that, you can't commit from the start to upholding the very constitutional arrangement that you need to change.
Well, for me, Farley is operating a dictatorship here in Tobago. Let me remind you the tha act is exactly the same as the national constitution.
Executive Council runs Tobago just like Cabinet runs Trinidad. It's exactly the same thing. Unsupervised, no oversight. With that arrangement in place, you can't make economic progress. But I can't tell you what the supporters of Valley or the supporters of the new government really understand.
[00:05:44] Speaker A: Well, one of the things I wanted to say to you, that the constitution is alive and well at the moment.
We are obligated and mandated to uphold it at the moment. It is the constitution of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago that we have to adhere to. And until it's changed, until the not the consensus, but until they take precise decision to change that constitution for the betterment of the people of the island and not only hold on to it because as you rightfully mentioned, it is a dictatorship constitution. It's one that we are saying to the people, really we get a chance every five years. Outside of that, we subjected to whatever rhetoric you hit on us for the next five years. We had to take that we had a, if it's good living, harsh living, whatever it is, we had to go through with it.
Revolting, protesting, marching, all these things against the law will see us in a worse off state.
So when we look at the critical.
[00:06:48] Speaker B: Thing, I think that you have to understand that the public has to understand is that you have to set up the government differently in order to make economic progress.
[00:06:58] Speaker A: Well then that leads me to my question, that leads me to my question.
What on the economic landscape, what do you see forthcoming or you think is necessary to boost the economy in Tobago at this time outside of the institution? Because if they don't change it, we had to operate within the remits of it. So if we have to operate and, and the Kamala Basad be Sessions administration does not seek constitutional reform even though they have the opportunity to at the moment. If they don't, what is Tobago? What, what does Tobago need right now to sustain its economy for the next five years to survive?
[00:07:32] Speaker B: Well, what it needs, it won't get. And it won't get, as the evidence shows, for the last 69 years, since Eric Williams, since 56, we didn't get it, we haven't gotten it and we will not get it. We won't get it in Trinidad and we won't get it in Tobago. What that means is simply this.
The fundamental transformation of the national economy, like the fundamental transformation of the tobago economy since 1898, is a transformation to trading, to an international trade on the basis of the things we can do very well, the things we can produce profitably very well and attract the world to come in and help us. For 69 years we have failed to do that and we can't do it in the framework, constitutional framework. We are operating because the entrepreneurial initiatives that would lead us to producing productively and profitably in a way that is consistent with the things we can do well, what we in economics call comparative advantage.
The institutional capacity to trade on that basis primarily lies in, in the communities of the country, in Laventille and in Charlotteville and where all the inventions and innovations that have driven us culturally over the decades, really, that's where they come from. They don't come from central government and petrotrend and those kinds of institutions. If you don't set up the constitution to allow those enterprises to come alive, I don't mean private enterprises, I mean state enterprises owned and run at the community level.
If you don't do that, you can't move this economy forward and you can't do that. You can't produce education for export and healthcare for export and so on without that base. And if you don't do that, if you want to do that, you have to reform the constitution. If you don't reform the constitution, you cannot undertake FOOTSTEPS that's the critical thing, the reform for crime, to get crime under control, to get education up to speed.
All of the things that the government is promising to do now, none of it could be done led by the central government.
[00:10:07] Speaker A: Now with that, almost all of it.
[00:10:08] Speaker B: Has to be done at the company level.
[00:10:10] Speaker A: Now with that being said, and I can appreciate what you said, let's look a little bit on tourism. What has the island been doing for the last few years and what do you think needs to be done to boost tourism? Farley is talking about bringing bringing back Sandals to the island. The talks are there. I saw some article where Sandals were committed to spending their own funds.
And of course, one of the deals on the table would be to use the working force of the Tobagonians while they were bringing internationals onto the island to see with certain things. I mean, those qualified in Trinidad and Tobago should be able to sustain jobs there as well. So we understand the economic standpoint and how you feel about that, Dr. James, but what about the tourism standpoint where we can boost on that?
And finally, before you respond in terms of all inclusive packages being affordable, all inclusive packages to foreigners and locals alike, because whenever we and Trinidadians come across Tobago, we are foreign to the island, so we come across there and we look for those packages. What is being done with the Hoteliers association to boost tourism on the island as well? Your response?
[00:11:15] Speaker B: Yeah, but those are not the places where you're going to have to look, look if you're going to make any difference to the kind of economy Tobago operates or Trinidad.
And the evidence of the science behind what I'm saying is in Jamaica, Jamaica invented the oil inclusives.
Across the world, they were the first inventors of oil inclusives.
They invented sandals. Jamaica more sandals than everybody else, and variants of sandals, beaches and other things like that.
Jamaica gets 2.5 million tourists coming in to visit those kinds of outfits, Ritz Carlton and Sanctuary and what have you.
They're still the worst performing economy in the Caribbean. Just a little better than Tobago.
Right. Leaving Haiti out of its consideration.
You can't make any progress. You could put down your sandals and all these things, but to make real economic progress, you have to do something else. You have to do a different kind of all inclusive. First of all, your all inclusive has to be based On a model of a safe, healthy, happy community that attracts people to come to solve different kinds of problems to that of the happiness going to bed in the sea. You have to provide people reasons to stay long term to get say health care solutions, say non communicable disease solutions. My team of doctors that works with me in the Eastern Caribbean, that team is putting together a bundle of programs that would be spread across the region that would allow you to attract 40 something year old people and above to find solutions to their non communicable diseases, right? Diabetes and overweight and all those sorts of things under professional care. But in a community that is safe because of the community empowerment program underlying it, that's healthy, right? And happy long life is healthy, happy life. Now that sort of stuff can't be done by a central government that has nothing to do with the standards. That's a different concept of a community as the all inclusive enterprise. Now in the same way, if you look in Malta, you see an equivalent of what I'm talking about. You see for example, a framework in which you could attract for an investment to come into the island to underwrite entrepreneurial development.
What you have for example, is a case in which all the foreign investment in Tobago that Farley might be talking about will come to build hotel plans and offer hotel services. Hotel services are low productivity, low value added services. But when you talk about an entrepreneurial development program, you're talking about setting up an accelerator in your community that big international investors want to come in to bring their startups, their innovative startups to participate in. They bring their family, they bring us the workers, they get access to citizenship by investment programs and other things like this that give them a signal that they could succeed based on the programming you're offering in Tobago, incubator accelerator type programs. That sort of stuff is not what Sanders is all about. That's the kind of all inclusive Tobago has to be thinking about. And let me say that's the kind of all inclusive that would give room for your creative industries to come alive.
Really and truly. That's a different approach to the creative industries that than the copying of the Trinidadian Tanner by the Tobagonians. So when you really want to talk seriously about development, you have to look at the international evidence. You have to look at why St. Kitts Nevis is progressing, why the Bahamas is progressing, why Cayman has already developed and gone past the US and Britain and so on, why Bermuda has already developed and gone past those, why Barbados is struggling, right, because of the type of tourism there. You look at what type of tourism you see in St. Pitts and it is. And you find the tourism that is based on the export of high quality education. They bring the whole world into Cayman, into Bermuda, into St. Kitts and so on to team up to export education or to export financial services as the case might be. That's the direction in which Tobago has to go. And that can't be done if your focus is on Sanders and it can't be done if the constitutional arrangement is that it, it has to be led by the tha.
So we have to change the law and we have to change the constitution to set a development path properly for Tobago and for the country. So when you back to my original point, if you start by saying you're not going to change it, then in the water.
[00:16:34] Speaker A: And that's the sad thing because what is happening on a global scale when it comes to tourism and sustain in tourism as a economic venture we have, you are right, Jamaica and other Caribbean islands doing it and solely reliant on it, on tourism as opposed to us with, with our natural resources here in Trinidad and Tobago. Now when we look at these systems.
[00:16:57] Speaker B: On tourism but not on beach tourism, that's the issue.
[00:17:01] Speaker A: So you're thinking that because we, we are heavy, we are heavily reliant in Tobago on beach tourism, we're heading there that way.
[00:17:09] Speaker B: We have no serious beach tourism in Tobago yet. But that's where they're heading and that's the wrong direction.
[00:17:14] Speaker A: All right, with that being said, what type of conversations need. Well, again we understand constitutional reform since the late Prime Minister Basio Pandey brought that to the fore, letting us know about it. And that means he's the first person I think in recent memory I can remember speaking on constitutional reform and the urgent.
[00:17:38] Speaker B: Very young man. But I want to remind you that position by Pandy came out of the work myself and Hochel Charles were doing with him when we were writing the Tobago plan. And we learned all of that from Lloyd west and absolutely long before. So since you're so young, you can't know all that history.
[00:17:57] Speaker A: Well, all right, well that's. Listen, I am always open to learning and thank you very much for sharing that.
I don't realize who I'm really chatting with this morning. Good to have you. So the thing about it is, I mean many of us remember Pandy for it and we remember that happening.
There are others who would remember as yourself, you know, where it came from and where Pandy would have gotten it. However, we come to understand that it's necessary for us to seriously govern our country into sustainable economic growth and moving forward, holding persons accountable, being able to do many things, are setting set election dates, having two terms for each Prime Minister, nobody ruling for a day, forever and a day. All these different things are necessary. But my fear is, in the event of it not materializing, what type of conversation does Tobago need to have with government now to sustain the economic future for the next five years? And this is by and large the fact that if we are not looking at that, so I'm saying while we understand its importance and the need for it in the absence of that in the moment, because why I say that question to you, Dr. James. We look at the governance of the PNM in this last hurrah with them in 2020-2025. They heavily were reliant on opposition to sign on with certain legislation as it relates to crime in, in this country and national security.
And because of the opposition not signing on and many things, it's as though they throw their hands up and it's like we can't move forward. But there were other things on the table that they could have continued to use and utilize. The new legislation would have assisted greatly. But in the absence of it, are we to give up? So that's the same question I'm posing to you. In the absence of constitutional reform, do we throw our hands in the air and say, unless this come, the economy of Tobago is, I mean, while it's going to be continuously on a spiral going downwards, can we do anything to sustain it in the event, you know, in the meantime, what are your recommendations?
[00:20:04] Speaker B: Well, let me, let me, let me cook up two answers. Therefore, the first is to make a simple observation that the PNM is no example to cite when you're talking about what should be done sensibly for the country. From the days of Eric Williams all the way through to Rowley, the PNM has been deaf and incapable of setting up the country in a way that allows us to make Progress. Rowley in 2015 during the election campaign made it clear he didn't animate a candidate.
He didn't want to change the rules.
That's been the mantra since pnm, since Eric Williams and Ellis Clark.
I'm old enough to remember all of that. I remember when Clara James was proposing what I am raising with you now.
Williams put him under house arrest, don't forget.
So at least Rollini didn't put Kamala under house arrest.
Now, the main idea is that's no lesson. The PNM also believed since 56 that the fundamental solution to the economic pathway problems of the country is oil and gas.
Remember, money is no problem. You're too young to remember when it was declared no problem after the oil boom started in 1973.
The PNM has never understood that you have to change the structure of the economy properly by a pathway that leads through constitutional form.
The answer to your second part of the question. The country cannot throw its hand up in the air, but the country, the citizens of the country, own the country. The government is not the owner of the country. The government obeys our instructions and we can't say if no constitution reform, then what else to do? We have to act and answer property question. What are we to do in order to get out of this fix we repeatedly find ourselves in? And if the answer is that we have to set up ourselves to release the entrepreneurial talent in Castara and release the entrepreneurial talent in Laventille and in Palm east and in Siparia, up and down, then we have to do that.
We can't say don't do it and hope for the best. God is not a trinity. Evidence is clear.
For 69 years we have seen ample evidence that it is wrong to believe that you could get away with not doing the right things. We need to change the structure of the economy. But unfortunately for us, we can't be afraid of the politics required to change the structure of the economy. And when you hear all of the euphoria about Kamala winning the election. I heard that same euphoria when Rowley won, when Kamala beat Manning first time. I heard it when Nair, when Robbie defeated. That was the first time we ever defeated the pnm. The euphoria was there in five years. Robbie almost lost his life, remember?
[00:23:12] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:23:13] Speaker B: Same circumstances. The oil industry was in collapse.
He used Section 75, 1 of the Constitution to try and pick up local adaptations to what the IMF would have recommended to him. Remember when they provided these bonds that citizens didn't trust and so on. All of that is a consequence of dictatorial government.
They're not wicked enough. Dictatorial is not wicked government. Dictatorial is just authoritarian design where you could only listen to yourself and you cannot hear from anybody else. If you don't set up the government today so that over the course of the next five years, Kamala could hear from everybody as to what we think, what we understand, what we know, where the problems causing the crime come from and all of that. If she's not going to set up the Government to be able to hear. All the talk about listening to the people and communicating with the people will be just shooting the breeze. You have to change the structure of the government to allow you to listen. You have no institutions to hear. The parliament is not set up to hear from anybody.
Section 751 says Cabinet runs the country. And the whole constitution is written to give effect to that. And you have to not forget that means no oversight. In other words, no mechanisms by which the cabinet can be forced to care from anybody else. And even if you went around to your constituencies and talked to them, it has no effect. Because as soon as you end up in cabinet, all 34 people in the cabinet, all the winners are in the cabinet. Now, as soon as you end up in the cabinet, you have to obey Kamra.
That's where Roli was. That's why Kimber couldn't do what he thought. He came to the parliament every year and said he was going to put in place wise, rational policies. Cussing Kamala every time about corruption. This round you're going to see the same thing. You cannot put wise, rational policies in place because that only comes when you are fully informed. And full information requires proper structures to hear from citizens, all citizens, whether they're on your side or they're not on your side. Let me remind you of one quick thing.
When Kamala was in the parliament running it in 2010-2015, she operated it as though Rowley doesn't even belong in the parliament.
Rowley took over in 2015 and he ran for 10 years, behaving as though Kamala shouldn't even come to Parliament. Don't even bother to.
This was a dictatorship of the cabinet in all of the 50, 15 years since 2010.
If you don't change that, you have no chance. Citizens cannot ask the question you are asking. How do we make progress without changing the most fundamental thing. The answer is you cannot make any progress. No matter what your goodwill is, no matter how much sandals you bring. You can't change the Tobago economy if you run an executive council dictatorship.
[00:26:25] Speaker A: It will not work, Dr. James. We have to leave it there. And I want to say thank you very much for chatting with me. And I mean, I hear your call for constitutional reform. Let's hope that this KPB administration would heed that call. This is her final stint. As far as we know, this is it. This is leaving a legacy for the country, for the future generations, the young ladies in society that will aspire to be to hold those high office. This is leaving a legacy and I thank you very much for chatting with us this morning. Continue to enjoy the sweet sunshine on the island of Tobago. And we will chat no sooner rather than later. We'll be in touch. Take care.
[00:27:02] Speaker B: All right. Good.
[00:27:02] Speaker A: All right. Good.
The best insight, instant feedback, accountability.
[00:27:08] Speaker B: The all new Talk Radio Freedom 106.5.
