Ramesh blamed for Caroni’s closure

UNITED National Congress (UNC) chairman Wade Mark on Thursday agreed with CL Financial chairman Lawrence Duprey that the former Government missed out on a golden opportunity to sell Caroni (1975) Limited’s rum distillery to CL World Brands. According to Mark, the blame rested squarely on the shoulders of former Attorney General Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj who stopped the sale of the distillery by alleging it was part of  “a sell-out” by the UNC to certain individuals. The UNC chairman declared that it was Maharaj’s opposition to that transaction which eventually led to Caroni’s closure and “put 10,000 people on the road”.  He said if the sale of the rum distillery had gone through, there would have been no need “to close down and destroy the sugar industry”, the UNC would have still been in Government and Maharaj would have still been AG. The UNC chairman reiterated the Opposition’s allegations that Maharaj and the People’s National Movement (PNM) had embarked on a programme to create ghost towns in Central and South Trinidad. Mark claimed that Maharaj has joined forces with a government which is hell bent on “racial and political discrimination”.