Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny chair­man Ger­ald Ramdeen is de­fend­ing the state com­pa­ny’s de­ci­sion to end its 21-year re­la­tion­ship with in­ter­na­tion­al rat­ings agency Moody’s, say­ing the move does not rep­re­sent a re­treat from trans­paren­cy or in­de­pen­dent scruti­ny.

In a let­ter re­spond­ing to crit­i­cism from for­mer min­is­ter Vas­ant Bharath, Ramdeen said NGC had in­stead en­gaged Fitch Rat­ings while main­tain­ing its ex­ist­ing re­la­tion­ship with S&P Glob­al Rat­ings.

Ramdeen said all three agen­cies are in­ter­na­tion­al­ly recog­nised mem­bers of the “Big Three” cred­it rat­ings firms and ar­gued the de­ci­sion was part of a strate­gic re­align­ment rather than an at­tempt to avoid over­sight.