Political analysts admit to being shocked by the Cabinet reshuffle announced by Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley via a press release from the Office of the Prime Minister yesterday.
Winford James told Guardian Media: “I did not expect a reshuffle,” since mere days before the Prime Minister had expressed “full confidence in all of his Ministers.”
But the reshuffle, he said, may not have been about a loss of confidence but rather that the Prime Minister was “seeking a better fit of his Ministers with the different portfolios.”
In the reshuffle, Darryl Smith who held the portfolio of Sports and Youth Affairs Minister was demoted to Minister in the Ministry of Housing. Randall Mitchell is no longer the Housing Minister.
That portfolio has been taken up by PM Rowley, in addition to his other responsibilities.
Mitchell has replaced Shamfa Cudjoe as Minister of Tourism and Cudjoe is the new Minister of Sports and Youth Affairs.
Maxie Cuffie who has been hospitalised for the past six months has been demoted to Minister in the Ministry of Public Administration. Marlene McDonald who was appointed Minister in the Ministry of Public Administration in March now assumes the full ministerial portfolio.
James said in the case of Cudjoe, the PM “was signalling that she made some missteps and misstatements on the matter of the sea transportation issue. The statement in particular that she is not a Tobagonian by boat and also that businessmen on the seabridge are fake businessmen, and statements of that kind which have angered a lot of the tourism stakeholders in Tobago.”
By his action, James said, the Prime Minister was “trying to reassure stakeholders in Tobago that he had been taking note,” and shifted Cudjoe to the Sports Ministry.
But tourism interests, he said, could take some “comfort” from her removal.
Political commentator Ralph Maraj said the PM’s reshuffle was “paltry” and was simply a case of “reshuffling bush cards. It is pathetic and will not improve the already low level of performance from what has been a substandard Cabinet.”
Maraj said the PM should have dismissed Darryl Smith. Shifting Smith to the Ministry of Housing, he said, was “a disastrous move. Generally, people feel he should not be in the Cabinet because of the allegations against him and then there is the question of the TT$93,000 jaunt to Tobago.”
Maraj was also of the view that Shamfa Cudjoe should have been dismissed, instead, she was assigned the portfolio of Minister of Sport and Youth Affairs. See Page A5
