Rowley: I cannot feed my chickens, pigs and sheep

For­mer Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley has crit­i­cised Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine over gov­er­nance in To­ba­go and the im­pact the out of ser­vice Blue Wave Har­mo­ny is hav­ing on his op­er­a­tions.

Row­ley said Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine want­ed and se­cured all 15 seats in the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly and the two Par­lia­men­tary seats so that no voice could ques­tion de­ci­sions. He said the sit­u­a­tion has led to chal­lenges for pro­duc­ers on the is­land.

He said he op­er­ates pens with thou­sands of chick­ens, pigs and sheep and can­not ac­cess feed be­cause there is no feed­mill in To­ba­go. He said his week­ly truck­ing arrange­ments have been dis­rupt­ed due to re­duced sail­ings and the ab­sence of a fixed sched­ule for the car­go ves­sel serv­ing the is­land.

Row­ley said the dis­rup­tion has placed his live­stock at risk as feed sup­plies de­pend on ship­ments from Trinidad. He said, "For most peo­ple it is just talk and opin­ions and ap­pear­ances but for me, one of the few PRO­DUC­ERS of any­thing in To­ba­go it is a re­al cri­sis since I have pens full of thou­sands of live an­i­mals ( chick­ens , pigs and sheep) for which I can’t get feed be­cause no feed­mill ex­ist in To­ba­go and my week­ly truck­ing is de­stroyed be­cause the boat has no sched­ule in a sig­nif­i­cant­ly re­duced fre­quen­cy."

He said de­spite these de­vel­op­ments he con­tin­ued to in­vest time and re­sources in To­ba­go. He said the cur­rent sit­u­a­tion rep­re­sents a cri­sis for his busi­ness and oth­er pro­duc­ers who re­ly on in­ter-is­land trans­port for sup­plies.

Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine has not re­spond­ed pub­licly to the claims.