PM’s Independence messages draw mixed reactions

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s two In­de­pen­dence Day mes­sages have drawn sharply dif­fer­ent re­ac­tions, with Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les and Mick­ela Pan­day crit­i­cis­ing what they de­scribed as di­vi­sive and po­lit­i­cal­ly mo­ti­vat­ed rhetoric, while po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Shane Mo­hammed de­fend­ed the Prime Min­is­ter’s first mes­sage as an op­por­tu­ni­ty for ob­jec­tive re­flec­tion on the coun­try’s de­vel­op­ment.