(Trinidad Express) In the face of questions about the propriety of the arrangement, former permanent secretary in the ministry of works, Cheryl Blackman, maintained yesterday she broke no rules when she allowed her minister, Jack Warner, to pay for the expenses for herself and other members of staff to travel to Jamaica.
“I didn’t think we did anything wrong,” she said.
She said she and other members of staff went on a private trip which had nothing to do with official government business.
Her description of the trip appears to contradict Warner’s version given at the meeting in Chaguanas on Thursday night, when he said: “I have never travelled for the government except once when in January 2011, I went to Jamaica with my permanent secretary and other members of staff from the Ministry of Works and Transport for the signing of the documents for the merger of Caribbean Airlines and Air Jamaica. For that trip, I paid all my expenses including my air travel and accommodation, and I also paid the expenses for my staff.”
Blackman, however, said she went on a private trip to Jamaica and had no official role, but admitted that Warner paid for her and other members of staff.
Told that concerns had been raised that it was highly irregular for a minister to pay for an official trip for any member of staff, Blackman asked: “Did you speak to him (Warner)?”
Told that he had made the statement on the platform, she said: “You should talk with him, since he said it.”
Pressed for comment, Blackman explained that the official delegation for that particular matter comprised three persons—the minister, the chairman of the board of Caribbean Airlines (George Nicholas 111) and the foreign service Representative in Jamaica.
“And if you look at the Cabinet minute that was the official delegation,” she said.
“We (herself and other members of staff) were there privately … at the same time (as Warner was there publicly),” she said.
Blackman, who is retired, was asked whether it was strange to have her minister pay for their expenses.
“But we didn’t go on government business. There are times when a ministry would be short of something and public officers would take their own money and buy stuff to conduct the ministry’s work, don’t you find that unusual? But you do it. I didn’t think we did anything wrong. We broke no rules at all. None,” Blackman said.
Asked how it came about that they were travelling on a private trip at the same time that the minister was going on public business to the same place, she said: “Mr Warner is the person who made that comment and I think you should speak with him. Let him explain to you. I and the ministry’s staff broke no rules or no laws.”
Asked how many members of staff went on the trip, she again advised the Express to speak to Warner.
Former head of the public service, Reginald Dumas, yesterday noted that the permanent secretary is the accounting officer in the ministry, the person who ensures that all the proper regulations and procedures are followed and therefore the permanent secretary “should not be in a position where she is taking gifts from the minister”.
Stressing that no minister should pay out of their own pockets for the permanent secretary and other members of staff “for whatever”, he said: “Then we could be in a serious situation, because the staff then becomes compromised. Suppose he is paying for a member of staff to go on a cruise? What is the member of staff giving in return? And how does this help Trinidad and Tobago? This would raise serious questions about the relationship between the minister and the public servant, with further questions therefore for the quality of governance in Trinidad and Tobago.”
Warner also stated at the meeting that he was responsible for Sepp Blatter’s election in 1998 and used a measure of subterfuge to achieve this end.
“An interesting development at that Congress was that Haiti was absent and with Blatter’s permission, I got Captain Horace Burrell’s (of Jamaica) girlfriend to vote as the Haitian delegate by saying “Oui”, when Haiti’s name was called.
Dumas said when he heard that he “was absolutely horrified”.
“As someone familiar with the norms of international behaviour, I have never heard of that in my life. You can’t put somebody in the seat of a country to vote for the country without the knowledge, let alone consent for the country. How could he go on a public platform and say that he put somebody to vote for a country and the country don’t know nothing about it?”
Dumas said Warner should never have done or disclosed that. “The current chairman of Caricom is the Haitian President,” Dumas said, asking how the Haitian President would feel hearing something like that from the former national security minister.
On Warner’s announcement that he would resign and wanted to contest the seat in three months time, Dumas said he was very clever because he identified the position with the Prime Minister, whom Warner said, told him that she could win the seat again easily.
“But the question is, since he admits that he has enemies within the hierarchy and he clearly identifies Suruj Rambachan without calling him by name, the question is: Would he be chosen to run again? He assumes that he will and he is up front signalling that he has to be because the Prime Minister and the UNC political leader already approves of his running again. And of course he has his constituents behind him,” Dumas said.
“Suppose he runs and wins again by a large margin, what impact is that going to have on the party and on his enemies within the party? And how does he then position himself within the party because he wants to make it clear to his enemies that he is not a man of straw. He might even want to settle scores with his enemies. If he is returned with a large majority, where does that place him within the hierarchy of power, within the party? And does the Prime Minister have to fear that he might strike? That he might now strike for maximum power?” Dumas asked.
Dumas said the other side of the coin was the issue of impact on any position Warner achieves within the hierarchy of power within the UNC would come from the findings of the various committees and investigative journalists like Camini Marajh, and the allegations that still swirl around and any possible legal action that might be brought.
He said Warner’s statement that the UNC had descended “from a beacon of hope to a dungeon of despair” was a very strong statement. He said the remark suggested that Warner would have to “rescue the party” and if there was so, then “certain people had to go”.
“He has put his opponents within the hierarchy of the party on the defensive. … He has put himself into a position of some political threat within the UNC, especially bearing in mind that he is by far the most popular MP in the country,” Dumas said.
He said by and large people in the country were saying FIFA business is FIFA business and Trinidad and Tobago business is Trinidad and Tobago business.
