A silent protest outside of the Office of the Prime Minister in St Clair may be the next best option for a group of concerned citizens seeking to get their message across over the ongoing sea bridge fiasco and Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley’s appointment of sole investigator Christian Mouttet.
This latest contemplation was disclosed to the T&T Guardian on Friday by Kendal Bhaggy, one of two people who started an online petition to have Mouttet’s appointment revoked hours after Rowley made the announcement via a release last Tuesday.
Yesterday there were 445 signatures on the petition. Bhaggy along with Suzanne Louwe hope to reach 500 signatures before they deliver it to Rowley.
However, not sure the petition will be sufficient to get Rowley’s attention, Bhaggy said they are now contemplating engaging in the silent demonstration “to get the PM’s attention for sure.”
“We do not know if the petition will be sufficient to have the appointment of Mr Mouttet revoked but something had to be said and we used this medium to do so,” Bhaggy said.
“We expect that the PM would have the decency and sense of duty to honour the wishes of the people by way of utilising transparent measures to deal with this fiasco.”
Bhaggy said the PM has a responsibility to the people of T&T, as he was elected as Prime Minister to lead the country to provide answers and solutions to fix and help move T&T out of its current situation.
“Political parties come and go and yet we are still faced with the same mess, even more. He (Rowley) has disappointed us not only with this ferry fiasco but many others as well. This petition just shows the Government that we the citizens are watching and we won’t stand by to be taken advantage of any more,” Bhaggy said.
In the petition, Bhaggy pointed out to Rowley that the people do not believe the appointment of Mouttet is in the best interest of the country.
“Mouttet’s perceived affiliation to the PNM produces doubt in the minds of the people that this investigation will be for the purpose of getting to the truth behind the Bridgemans Services Group’s awarded contract,” Bhaggy wrote.
He suggested that the appointment of an independent forensic auditor should have been given the job instead of Mouttet.
Bhaggy said people believe there is a chance of a cover up and the Government should not have taken this route.
“We are calling on you to remove or revoke the appointment of Mr Mouttet and contract an independent forensic auditor to handle this investigation, in the best interest of the people and in the best interest of transparency. We do not support your decision to appoint Mouttet as the sole investigator and we make that abundantly clear by putting forward this petition,” Bhaggy outlined in the petition.