00:00Trinidad and Tobago's new Prime Minister, Stuart Young, said during his first post-cabinet
00:05media briefing that Thursday marked the second cabinet meeting since he and his ministers
00:10took their oaths of office on Monday.
00:13The new Prime Minister then referred to his announcement on Tuesday that the 2025 general
00:18election shall take place on April 28th.
00:22We as a government and certainly as a party intend to have free and fair elections as
00:29we've always had and as the EBC has always carried out in Trinidad and Tobago.
00:34But we learn from our mistakes, we learn from history, meaning that we see every time a
00:40particular party loses an election in Trinidad, they look for every excuse as to why it is
00:46they've lost and they run to the courts, etc.
00:49Prime Minister Young was responding to opposition leader Kamala Prasad Mbassa's letter to him
00:53on Wednesday in which she wrote that despite the government's invitation to CARICOM observers,
00:59the opposition strongly believes that independent, non-Caribbean international observers are
01:05necessary to ensure a free and fair electoral process.
01:09Prime Minister Young referred to what he called a spurious allegation.
01:13And I'm referring to former Attorney General Reginald Armour and the fact that his wife
01:17now works at CARICOM is completely ridiculous but not surprising.
01:22So we have invited CARICOM and CARICOM is on its way for April 28th.
01:27And Prime Minister Young then announced that international observers have also been invited.
01:32Before I saw the letter from the leader of the opposition, I had also dispatched an official
01:39letter as the Prime Minister to the Right Honourable Baroness Patricia Scotland, King's
01:44Council, Commonwealth Secretary General, requesting that the Commonwealth Secretariat provide
01:51observers as well to Trinidad and Tobago's election.
01:55We will invite the Carter Centre as well to send people here to come and observe free
02:00and fair elections.
02:02The Prime Minister said he instructed the Foreign Minister on Thursday to officially
02:06invite the observers from the US-based Carter Centre.
02:10Jule Brown, TV6 News.
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