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THE EDITOR: The Prime Minister is exercising his right as head of the executive and as such his Cabinet composition cannot be perceived as an anomaly or something that does not obtain in other parliamentary democracies or systems of government that pattern the Westminster style.
In TT, a look at the Cabinet compositions under the first prime minister, Dr Eric Williams, will reveal that from 1955 to 1981 there were changes almost every year – sometimes there were 13 members, sometimes 14, then 12 and then the number ascended again. The bottom line is that he adjusted his Cabinet according to how he saw fit.
With a changing economy, plural society, circumstances changing, every subsequent prime minister (George Chambers, ANR Robinson, Patrick Manning, Basdeo Panday, Kamla Persad-Bissessar) reconfigured their Cabinet, realigned portfolios based on need, the human resources they had with the relevant forte. There are some portfolios that have been renamed, made redundant and merged under one umbrella.
For example, under one prime minister, the Ministry of Works/Transport/Infrastructure was three separate ministries; the Ministry of External Affairs no longer exists and the contemporary term foreign affairs applies. Some administrations (both PNM and UNC) have had foreign affairs together with communications and information as one ministry and then as separate entities based on variables that the sitting prime minister would have taken into account.
Under former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, there were five Cabinet reshuffles during her premiership from 1979 to 1990: 1979-1981; 1981-1983; 1983-1987; 1987-1989; 1989-1990. The preceding demonstrates that Thatcher was exercising her prerogative in having people in her Cabinet as she saw fit. There were even times when she had non-portfolioed or ministers of state in her Cabinet.
Former prime minister Patrick Manning, who was the longest serving Member of Parliament in TT, organised his Cabinet under his terms in office according to how he saw fit. His Cabinet of 1991-1995 was far different in membership and number to 2002-2007 and saw many neophytes of the female gender from 2007 to May 24, 2010.
In 2009 when sitting president of South Africa Thabo Mbeki was asked by the national executive committee of the African National Congress (ANC) to resign, his successor Kgalema Motlanthe announced that he would keep 18 of the ministers from his predecessor and then there were ten new ministers.
With the same ANC, former president Jacob Zuma had a Cabinet of 36 ministers, which seemed to be the largest ever, surpassing Nelson Mandela’s government of national unity when he was president from 1994 to 1999.
It must be noted that Mandela’s government and Cabinet included his predecessor, former president FW de Klerk, who was head of the white Nationalist Party, and the belligerent leader of the Inkatha Freedom Party, Mangosuthu Buthelesi, who was made minister of home affairs and continued in the post after Mandela demitted office and even acted as president on several occasions.
Former prime minister Persad-Bissessar reshuffled her Cabinet every year while in office. Once again underscoring a prime minister's prerogative.
I say with a high degree of certitude that the adage “Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown” probably has reverberated in every prime minister's head given that the population looks at them for accountability and transparency.

HANSEN STEWART

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