Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine has pub­licly re­ject­ed for­mer Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley’s claim that the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) re­quest­ed two Toy­ota Pra­dos in its ini­tial oil spill re­sponse bill, call­ing the state­ment false and mis­lead­ing.

Speak­ing at a po­lit­i­cal meet­ing in Cas­tara on Wednes­day night, Au­gus­tine said the THA con­tin­ues to op­er­ate un­der se­vere fi­nan­cial con­straints.

“The THA is work­ing like how you build a house with lit­tle mon­ey. You buy ce­ment, you put up a piece, you get some steel, you put up a next piece,” Au­gus­tine said. “That is how we op­er­ate be­cause of how we are be­ing fund­ed.”