Defence Ministry recruiting more soldiers; CCC, MILAT programmes being restructured

The Min­istry of De­fence is re­cruit­ing ad­di­tion­al mem­bers for the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force (TTDF), with De­fence Min­is­ter Wayne Sturge say­ing the ex­pan­sion is nec­es­sary to meet the coun­try's grow­ing se­cu­ri­ty and re­gion­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ties.

Sturge al­so an­nounced that TTDF per­son­nel will soon re­ceive out­stand­ing salary ar­rears fol­low­ing the set­tle­ment of wage ne­go­ti­a­tions, while the Gov­ern­ment has in­creased ex gra­tia pay­ments to $250,000.

Full coverageMinisters Detail Government Spending Plans During Budget Hearings8 reports

The min­is­ter made the dis­clo­sures dur­ing Wednes­day's meet­ing of the Stand­ing Fi­nance Com­mit­tee as par­lia­men­tar­i­ans ex­am­ined the Min­istry's pro­posed $461.537 mil­lion al­lo­ca­tion for 2027. He was re­spond­ing to ques­tions from Op­po­si­tion MPs Stu­art Young, Mar­vin Gon­za­les, Ka­reem Mar­celle and oth­ers.