The po­lit­i­cal fall­out over Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s de­ci­sion to skip the Eman­ci­pa­tion Sup­port Com­mit­tee of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s (ES­CTT) Lidj Ya­su Omowale Eman­ci­pa­tion Vil­lage on Sat­ur­day has in­ten­si­fied, with the Op­po­si­tion ac­cus­ing her of dis­re­spect­ing one of the coun­try’s most sig­nif­i­cant na­tion­al ob­ser­vances.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar, how­ev­er, ac­cused the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) of ex­ploit­ing Eman­ci­pa­tion Day to deep­en racial di­vi­sions.

Al­though the Prime Min­is­ter was ad­ver­tised as de­liv­er­ing the fea­ture ad­dress at the vil­lage at 3 pm, she in­stead spent the day with her fam­i­ly.