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Mr Justice Ronnie Boodoosingh is worthy of holding the office of Chief Justice to which he was appointed on Wednesday and I congratulate him. He is a person who may be able to heal some of the wounds that his vulnerable predecessor, former Chief Justice Ivor Archie, inflicted on trust and confidence in the Judiciary.
Nobody knows why, but former Chief Justice Archie abruptly activated his notice given last month that he intended to retire.
(via Office of the President.)
Regrettably, it appears that the acting President of the Republic botched the express constitutional requirement for consultation by that office when the occasion for the appointment of a chief justice arises.
My comments on that fiasco were already made to the media.
Turning therefore to other current anxieties about the state of the nation, the annual Budget presentation that is made in the House of Representatives in October has long ago evolved into a lengthy address by the Minister of Finance on the state of our island nation.
Copyright: Office of the Parliament 2025.
This October, more than ever, open-minded citizens are wrestling to arrive at an accurate assessment of the state of our tiny island nation, which once had a solid gross domestic product (GDP) but was left to remain in persistent economic decline hurting many people.
We are also proof that a healthy GDP does not reveal the state of the nation in terms of standard of living and well-being.
Quality of life in Trinidad and Tobago has been gravely compromised by violent crime, highlighted by high murder rates and the commission of murder and other serious crimes with widespread impunity and a persistently low crime detection rate.
(via Office of the President.)
On top of the economic decline, the latest State of Emergency declared to combat violent crime will end this month. How effective has this State of Emergency been and what next?
Davendranath Tancoo, MP, is the minister of finance of the United National Congress (UNC) Government, which was elected after comprehensively defeating the People’s National Movement (PNM) last April. He made the annual budget presentation on 13 October.
In this column in August 2024, while the PNM were still in government, I expressed concern that the country might go broke. In response, a highly placed government source informed me then that we were not going to go broke.
I remained unconvinced because, as is well recognized—other than in one year when global conditions triggered a spike in energy prices—government expenditure has greatly exceeded revenue, routinely producing sizeable deficits.
Despite this, there has been insignificant action towards socio-economic reform, preferably by means of more gradual shifts in the way the country is run, rather than in the form of the usually harsh terms of structural adjustment.
Instead of reform, over many decades in Trinidad and Tobago, all of our governments have simply sought to share the wealth through transfers and subsidies—for example, funding make-work programs, fuel subsidies and uneconomic utility rates—even while permitting certain state enterprises not to pay their huge utility bills.
These are serious strains on the country’s revenue while revenue has been persistently declining.
As narrow-minded as our partisan politics are, it might upset UNC party zealots to have these concerns expressed at the beginning of another UNC reign.
However, these concerns have been somewhat soothed by the emphatic projection of the oratorically gifted Minister Tancoo, that the budget deficit will be brought down in 2026 to $3.87 billion from the 2025 overall deficit of $9.67 billion, which he reportedly estimated in his mid-year review.
Photo: Office of the Parliament 2025.
Minister Tancoo has therefore built into his 2025/2026 budget presentation, clear means by which to measure its accuracy and success.
Hopefully, more borrowing, “creative accounting” and grants from international sources will not be used to foster unrealistic claims of success at bringing the deficit down to this Government’s projected amount.
Sadly, elements of the PNM, now in Opposition, remain so punch drunk from the catastrophic election defeat into which former Prime Ministers Dr Keith Rowley and Stuart Young led the party, that they were pitifully outmanoeuvred in the now concluded House of Representatives debate.
Photo: Office of the Parliament 2025.
I recommend that the party go into rehab—that is political rehab—and come out of it clean of their old ideas and the constant reflex to moan about their rejection.
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Martin G Daly SC is a prominent attorney-at-law. He is a former Independent Senator and past president of the Law Association of Trinidad and Tobago.
He is chairman of the Pat Bishop Foundation and a steelpan music enthusiast.
When Eminence Ages Badly: Martin Daly’s Descent from Principle to Pantomime
Martin Daly SC has once again emerged from the fog, armed with indignation and nostalgia, to assure the nation that he alone still understands how the Republic should be run. Unfortunately, his latest column shows less constitutional acuity and more the crankiness of a retired prefect still scolding the assembly long after the bell has rung.
Daly begins by congratulating Chief Justice Ronnie Boodoosingh — before immediately suggesting that his appointment was “botched.” This is the verbal equivalent of shaking someone’s hand while pickpocketing their reputation. His obsession with the word “botched” persists despite his own admission that Justice Boodoosingh is both competent and worthy. Apparently, even competence must now be tainted with Daly’s signature brand of suspicion.
What he continues to misunderstand — or perhaps wilfully ignore — is that efficiency does not equal impropriety. The Acting President acted within Section 102 of the Constitution: consult, appoint, move on. The country avoided a judicial vacuum. But Daly prefers drama to diligence. To him, prompt constitutional action looks like conspiracy because it deprives him of a slow-motion scandal to narrate.
His nostalgia for the “good old days” now colours every subject he touches. Having exhausted the Judiciary, he veers into economics — announcing that the nation is “in persistent decline,” that governments of every stripe are reckless spenders, and that the new Minister of Finance is an “oratorically gifted” optimist who must not borrow too much. It’s less a column than a séance with the ghost of Eric Williams.
He accuses the People’s National Movement of needing “rehab,” a curious recommendation from someone who can’t seem to withdraw from the habit of contradiction. Under the PNM, he predicted bankruptcy; under the UNC, he predicts the same but sprinkles in a compliment to the Minister’s diction. The only consistent theme is Daly himself — centre stage, forever warning that the sky is falling.
What Daly calls “analysis” has devolved into self-referential theatre: he quotes his earlier columns as evidence, sets up straw men, then congratulates himself for knocking them down. It is difficult to decide whether to laugh or to send help.
To his credit, Daly still writes in complete sentences — a skill now rare in public discourse — but the substance has thinned. His columns have become cautionary exhibits in what happens when once-formidable intellects refuse to retire their own certainties.
The country, meanwhile, moves on. The Chief Justice is duly sworn, the courts function, and the Constitution remains unblemished. The rest is Daly’s lament — a symphony for one, played on a worn violin of grievance.
If this is the state of our national commentary, then perhaps the real “botched process” is not in the Judiciary at all, but in the slow decay of critical thought among those who mistake memory for insight.