Sando East MP accuses Govt of ‘Nazification’ of T&T

As Trinidad and To­ba­go marked 50 years as a re­pub­lic on Thurs­day, with scouts, cadets, brown­ies and girl guides parad­ing through San Fer­nan­do, the mile­stone was quick­ly over­shad­owed by po­lit­i­cal fall­out from a marathon overnight sit­ting of Par­lia­ment, with San Fer­nan­do East MP Bri­an Man­ning ac­cus­ing the Gov­ern­ment of pre­sid­ing over the “Naz­i­fi­ca­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

The par­lia­men­tary de­bate end­ed dra­mat­i­cal­ly just af­ter mid­night when the Spe­cial Op­er­a­tions Bill, 2026, passed in the Sen­ate af­ter Sen­ate Pres­i­dent Wade Mark cast the de­cid­ing vote to break a 15-15 dead­lock. Gov­ern­ment sen­a­tors backed the leg­is­la­tion unan­i­mous­ly, while it re­ceived no sup­port from Op­po­si­tion or In­de­pen­dent sen­a­tors.

Speak­ing to re­porters af­ter the Re­pub­lic Day pa­rade, San Fer­nan­do May­or Robert Par­ris said the de­vel­op­ments in the Sen­ate were trou­bling.