Imbert: UNC first to target Afro-Trini males

A WORLD BANK report proves it was the UNC which first targetted young Afro-Trinidadian males for special recruitment by COSTAATT. This was the revelation yesterday by Science, Technology and Tertiary Education Minister Colm Imbert during debate in Parliament on a private member’s motion filed by St Joseph MP Gerald Yetming.

Quoting from a June 2000 World Bank report entitled “Trinidad and Tobago Youth and Social Development — An Integrated Approach for Social Inclusion,” Imbert declared: “In terms of at-risk youth, students of self-declared African origin have been significantly more likely to score lower than those of Mixed or Indian origin. The purpose of this study was to define and identify at risk groups within the secondary and tertiary education system of TT. This classification reinforces perception of inferiority and low self-esteem among the students who performed poorly, the students of African origin. They (UNC) wanted to hide this. A World Bank-UNC document. They knew that young African males were the greatest at-risk youth within our secondary and tertiary education system but they come in this Parliament and say a tissue of untruths and say that they don’t know.” He said former Social Development, Sport and Youth Affairs Minister Manohar Ramsaran was “pivotal” in the report’s creation.

Describing the UNC as the “greatest hypocrites,” Imbert revealed that over 90 percent of the students currently enrolled at the TT Institute of Technolo-gy (TTIT) were of East Indian origin and of the 22 lecturers at TTIT, 12 were East Indian. The Minister said these students, now in the final stages of three and four year degrees, first enrolled at TTIT under the UNC. He also disclosed that according to region, a whopping 85 percent of TTIT students were from Central and South Trinidad while a mere four and 0.5 percent of TTIT students were from North-West Trini-dad and Tobago respectively. Explaining that COSTAATT’s social un-derpinning was to identify at-risk groups in the society, Imbert said it was “unfortunate that the UNC could not differentiate between enrollment and recruitment. The Minister said despite recognising the need to help young African males, the UNC never delivered on that promise and a clear pattern of male underachievement had emerged since the early 1990s. He declared that UNC charges of racism at COSTAATT were ludicrous and referred to one COSTA-ATT institution where 71 percent of the current student population are of  East Indian descent.

Imbert said women from rural communities were the second highest at-risk group, after young African males and Government will conduct a study to find ways of helping them. He lamented that Yetming was “dragged to the altar” and called on the UNC to “own up” for what they had done. Reiterating there was documentation on male underachievement in the Caribbean and especially TT over the last 20 years, Imbert declared it was “very difficult” to believe that the UNC was unaware of this problem.