Caption: An elderly resident of Caroni holds hands with Neil Gosine in prayer during a walkabout
AS we walk through the streets of Chaguanas West, speaking to business owners, families, and youth, one issue continues to rise to the surface, the unbearable pressure of a mismanaged economy under the PNM administration.
Let’s look at the facts.
When the PNM assumed office in 2015, our country’s net foreign reserves stood at a healthy US$9.93 billion, offering an 11.2-month cover for imports, a critical buffer for any nation.
Fast forward to 2024, and those reserves have been drained down to US$5.6 billion, with only eight months of import cover remaining. In just under a decade, they’ve burned through over US$4 billion in reserves, and the people of Chaguanas West are left wondering, where did it go?
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The Central Bank injected nearly US$12 billion into the foreign exchange market over the same period in a desperate attempt to stabilise supply amid dwindling oil and gas production.
But despite this massive injection, ordinary citizens and small businesses in our community are still struggling to access basic foreign exchange to import goods, pay for services, or even travel. Meanwhile, the black market thrives, forcing businesspeople to pay upwards of TT$7 to 9 per US$, if they can find it at all.
Add to that the $2.4 billion that this Government quietly withdrew from our Heritage and Stabilization Fund and the doubling of our foreign debt from $2.5 billion to $5.2 billion. This is not fiscal responsibility, this is reckless mismanagement .
While they boast about macroeconomic “stability”, the people on the ground feel the instability every day, in higher grocery bills, rising costs of imported goods, and the uncertainty of doing business.
We in the UNC believe it’s time for a government that puts the people first. That means managing our national resources responsibly, ensuring fair and transparent access to foreign exchange, and creating a truly enabling environment for small and medium businesses to thrive.
Chaguanas West deserves better. Trinidad and Tobago deserves better. It’s time to restore confidence, equity, and competence in economic management, and only the UNC is prepared to deliver that future.
Neil Gosine is an insurance executive and the current candidate of the United National Congress (UNC) for Chaguanas West in the April 28, 2025, general elections. He is also an ex-treasurer of the UNC and a former chairman of the National Petroleum Marketing Company of Trinidad and Tobago (NP). He holds a Doctorate in Business Administration, a Master’s in Business Administration MBA, a BSc in Mathematics and a BA in Administrative Studies. The views and comments expressed in this column are not necessarily those of AZP News, a Division of Complete Image Limited
