I write to correct what I view as the travesty of justice in Keith Subero's column headlined "From banking to bloodsport".

I must say I was immensely disappointed at what appeared to be an attempt to demean the Finance Minister, Larry Howai, and his contribution to no apparent end. From the outset, I am a supporter of the People's Partnership Government, but I believe all right-thinking persons must have been left wondering whether Mr Subero's column was based on an agenda rather than an understanding of the facts.

It was clear that Mr Subero, who must clearly be a PNM (People's National Movement) sympathiser, decided to take aim at someone whom he saw as one of the Government's rising stars, Mr Howai. To what end though remains the question.

After reading Subero's winding treatise, in which he struggled and failed to bring about the dramatic end he intended, I am still left to wonder what exactly his problem is with Mr Howai.

A quick context if you will. Mr Howai is a Minister of Finance who inherited deficit spending, in a Government which inherited a fiscal position of hyper-accelerated recurrent expenditure, even amid falling revenues—a direct fallout of the 2008 global financial crisis.

Mr Howai inherited the mostly successful efforts of the former minister of finance, Winston Dookeran, at reforms. Mr Howai's charge was now to take the economy from a stabilised position and inspire it into the powerhouse that it once was, the powerhouse that was almost crashed by the previous administration's refusal to take sound advice.

We all remember the advice to decelerate capital programmes (for which no economic value was created), cool down the construction sector (which the then government presumed to lead rather than allow contractors to be the lead investors) and rein in the fiscal irresponsibility which characterised the years of the PNM.

I would therefore ask that while the Express respects its columnists' right to express their thoughts and views, they also correct and, where necessary, demand that their columnists substantiate their claims.

No opinion-maker must ever be given such privilege as to have his claims unquestioned, especially when they are agenda rather than fact-driven.

Jairam Bhola

via e-mail