Parliamentary Digest

You wouldn’t think that a debate on smelter plants could be related to dental health. But Tabaquite MP Adesh Nanan accomplished this feat effortlessly. But Nanan, of course, is a man who only recently linked the murder of 11-year-old Dane Andrews to the Students’ Revolving Loan, on the basis that Dane’s murder stopped him attending university.

Friday was Private Members’ Day in the Lower House, and Nanan had brought a motion to discuss pollution by aluminium smelters to be constructed at Chatham and La Brea.

Before he started, Princes Town MP Subas Panday had presented a petition from his constituents concerning roadworks needed, purportedly, because of “many serious and fatal accidents” which had occurred in a particular vicinity.

The petition did not include any statistics to prove this assertion, however, and, since UNC MPs have been bringing these things every time the Lower House has sat recently, the petitions may have more to do with the imminence of Local Government elections than concern for constituents.

Opposition MP Nizam Baksh then asked that the business of the House be deferred to discuss the issue of child abuse, but was turned down by Speaker Barry Sinanan, who noted that the matter was “worthy of discussion” but suggested that Baksh bring his concern at the adjournment of the House under Standing Order 11. However, despite Baksh’s putative concern that the issue was a definite matter of urgent public importance, he made no attempt to raise it when the House adjourned 15 minutes early.

After Education Minister Hazel Manning answered a few questions from the Opposition, all designed to impute nepotistic actions on the part of the Ministry in the award of school construction contracts, Nanan rose at 1:56 pm to present his motion. And the fact that he was leading this particular charge revealed the weakness of the Opposition forces. While the Government had their full complement of seats, there were only eight UNC MPs present - and none of them were from the Dookeran faction.

By the time Nanan started talking, only four of his colleagues remained in the chamber to hear him. Even Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar, who had come into the House bedecked in a yellow-and-red sari, was busy with damage control after Thursday’s debacle when Political Leader Winston Dookeran had walked out of a meeting of the executive. Persad-Bissessar had sent Dookeran a letter inviting him to talk with her: but whether this was a “peace letter” or a “piece letter” is still to be seen.

So Nanan was the UNC’s star for that afternoon. He began by promising to “briefly outline” the processes of the aluminium smelter industry — a promise which no one believed.

Indeed, Point Fortin MP Larry Achong interrupted to wonder aloud what Nanan knew about this topic. The Speaker rose and responded, “I thought that, apart from your being a dentist, you are also a scientist and a chemist. Please continue.” Taking the laughter from the MPs and the public as a compliment, Nanan did so.

He promised to point out, as a dentist, the benefits of fluorides “but I will also point out, Mr Speaker, to the House, that when you use fluorides in large quantities it can be dangerously deadly.”

“You will recall, Mr Speaker, in Colorado in 1902,” he began. Sinanan raised his eyebrows at this assumption of his wide knowledge or the imputation about his age.

Nanan had the grace to blush and try again. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, Mr Speaker,” he said, and went on to talk about the stained teeth of children in Colorado 104 years ago. “It is important to understand where fluorides come from,” said Nanan, and spent 15 minutes telling the House all about them. He extolled the virtues of fluoridisation of the water supply, then said that the proposed Alcoa smelter would be sitting right on top an aquifer. “I will be asked, well okay, you said that fluorides are very good for preventing tooth decay, and the plant will be producing fluorides.” Clearly, Nanan grossly overestimated the interest in his contribution.

But he did manage to arouse astonished laughter from the House when, after listing the various fluoride pollutants, he said, “The Prime Minister might be the initiator of genocide, Mr Speaker.” The Concise Oxford English Dictionary defines “genocide” as “the deliberate killing of a large group of people, esp. those of a particular ethnic group or nation”, but Nanan did not say whether Patrick Manning was going to kill Afro-Trinidadians, Indo-Trinidadians, or just unhyphenated Trinidadians.

Ironically, Nanan had to stop quarter-way through his speech in order to let Manning make a statement, not on any plans to murder thousands of people, but to postpone Local Government elections for a year.

But this did not throw Nanan off his stride since, when he resumed, he continued speaking of “explosive explosions,” cow’s milk being contaminated, and, he promised, “You will have dwarfs in Cedros” with La Brea MP Hedwige Bereaux seeming to take particular offence at this last sally.

Since Environment Minister Penelope Beckles ended the session, the next Private Members’ Day should have something more substantial on the Order Paper.