By Clint Chan Tack Friday, April 25 2008

FORMER Trade and Industry Minister Dr Keith Rowley yesterday slammed Prime Minister Patrick Manning for saying his conduct and not his concerns about a lack of Cabinet oversight on the operations of the Urban Development Corporation of Trinidad and Tobago (Udecott) was the reason why he was fired from the Cabinet on Wednesday.

The Prime Minister outlined his version of events which led to Rowley’s dismissal at yesterday’s post-Cabinet news conference at Whitehall.

Before he left for Tobago to attend this weekend’s Plymouth Jazz Festival, Rowley said he was “quite stunned” that Manning could say the construction of a 60-room hotel as part of the Academy for the Performing Arts at the Princes Building Grounds in Port-of-Spain was always on the cards. The former minister insisted that if this was true, the population would not have been taken by surprise as he was when Udecott made its presentation to Cabinet’s Finance and General Purposes Committee (FGP) at Whitehall on April 14.

Rowley said Manning’s comments about five unnamed government ministers describing his behaviour at the committee meeting as “atrocious and unbecoming of a minister” were “very curious.”

“I am not a wajang. I am not a hooligan and there is no remote truth that I have conducted myself in that manner. I spoke, that’s it. I didn’t shout, I didn’t use foul language, I didn’t accost anybody, I didn’t throw my shoe, I didn’t climb on the table, I didn’t bang the table, and I am surprised if I am being called a hooligan, that the action on my part that deemed that action to be warranted cannot be described.”

While he had no idea who these ministers were, Rowley said he would be very surprised if any of his former Cabinet colleagues would publicly identify themselves as being the ones who made such statements to the Prime Minister. Government officials said new Trade and Industry Minister Dr Lenny Saith was appointed the FGP chairman following last November’s general election and he is the only fixed member of the committee. Officials said the matters discussed by the FGP determine which other government ministers attend its meetings. Rowley reiterated he behaved properly at all times during the meeting as he “passionately expressed” his views about the Udecott proposal. He further stated that the fact he asked public servants to excuse themselves from the meeting to talk with his former colleagues was not the action of a man out of control.

While stating his concerns about a lack of Cabinet oversight on Udecott’s operations stand, Rowley said he was not paying heed to a call from the Opposition UNC to “take his allegations of corruption involving persons in Udecott, the Government and private sector companies” to the police, the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Integrity Commission. “Tell the Opposition to leave me out of their politics. I am not prosecuting any case for them.”

The former minister added that just because a process is faulty does not mean it is corrupt but warrants attention before any kind of impropriety can take root.