Imbert, PM spar on UNC, PNM ‘drug links’

Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

Op­po­si­tion Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) deputy leader Colm Im­bert yes­ter­day called out Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar on if she was aware the US Drug En­force­ment Agency (DEA) had sought the ex­tra­di­tion of two Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) op­er­a­tives be­cause stolen mon­ey was be­ing sent by them to a Colom­bian drug car­tel.

But Per­sad-Bisses­sar coun­tered that she was aware that PNM’s Bal­isi­er House, Port-of-Spain head­quar­ters was “fi­nanced by drug mon­ey.”

The two sparred on the is­sue in Par­lia­ment yes­ter­day, af­ter Per­sad-Bisses­sar con­clud­ed her re­port on join­ing the US-led Amer­i­c­as Counter-Car­tel Coali­tion. She had at­tacked the PNM re­peat­ed­ly with var­i­ous claims, in­clud­ing that the PNM’s head of­fice was built with drug mon­ey.

Im­bert asked her, “In light of the al­le­ga­tions made, is the Prime Min­is­ter aware that the US sought the ex­tra­di­tion of two UNC op­er­a­tives be­cause mon­ey stolen in the con­tro­ver­sial Pi­ar­co Air­port project was flagged by the DEA as be­ing sent to a drug car­tel in Colom­bia by those UNC op­er­a­tives?”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, “MP— no, I’m not aware... I’m aware—and we now have lists, Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty has lists... OK, I’ll send you the lists, maybe your name is on it. What I’m aware of is that drug mon­ey fi­nanced Bal­isi­er House!”

The PM slammed the PNM dur­ing her ad­dress. She said, “For one decade, while the PNM were in gov­ern­ment, blood flowed on T&T streets, dri­ven by vi­o­lent gangs fight­ing for turf to sell il­le­gal arms and nar­cotics, traf­ficked in­to T&T by the drug car­tels.

“Whilst that was hap­pen­ing, many in the PNM hi­er­ar­chy fat­tened their pock­ets from their lo­cal drug mafia fi­nanciers while the peo­ple suf­fered. The new, blood red Bal­isi­er House stands as a grave­stone to drug mon­ey, pae­dophil­ia and theft...” Per­sad-Bisses­sar claimed.

Op­po­si­tion MP Camille Robin­son-Reg­is ob­ject­ed based on a stand­ing or­der. House Speak­er Jagdeo Singh asked Per­sad-Bisses­sar to use more neu­tral lan­guage.

The PM, who said she didn’t name any­one, added, “If it falls in your front yard, so be it. Be­tween 2015 and 2025, there were 124,062 crimes. Over 5,000 per­sons were vi­o­lent­ly mur­dered, over 9,000 were bru­tal­ly raped or sex­u­al­ly as­sault­ed, and over 11,000 were robbed of their hard-earned pos­ses­sions un­der the for­mer PNM gov­ern­ment, while they did noth­ing.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar added, “They seem to take per­verse pride in the fact that PNM strong­holds have amongst the high­est crime rates, the high­est un­em­ploy­ment, the low­est ed­u­ca­tion­al at­tain­ment, the low­est op­por­tu­ni­ties and the worst in­fra­struc­ture...

“That’s why you hear them on the oth­er side cry­ing every day about radars, US troops, and US lists ... maybe some of their names are on that US list. I don’t know, I haven’t seen the list.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar fur­ther claimed, “The PNM, their lo­cal drug mafia fi­nanciers, their pae­dophile lodge friends and the fake eat-ah-food elite clear­ly views ...”

PNM leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les ob­ject­ed, al­so based on the stand­ing or­ders. How­ev­er, Speak­er Singh said he didn’t think it was of­fen­sive, in­sult­ing or di­rect­ed to an MP.

Beck­les added, “Mr Speak­er, you’re say­ing that re­mark isn’t di­rect­ed to a Mem­ber of the House?”

Singh said it wasn’t di­rect­ed to an MP but an en­ti­ty. Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she hadn’t named any­one.