(Trinidad Express) Finance Minister Winston Dookeran will act as Prime Minister during Kamla Persad-Bissessar’s trip to India this month.
The chair of acting Prime Minister was a revolving one in 2011, with four different ministers of the People’s Partnership Government taking up the post in Persad-Bissessar’s absence.
Labour Minister Errol McLeod was the first to be placed in the position, in February 2011, while Persad-Bissessar attended a Caricom meeting in Grenada.
Finance Minister and former leader of the Congress of the People (COP) Winston Dookeran held the position four times prior to his current stint.
In July last year, Dookeran held on for Persad-Bissesar and during that time he called for a clause to be added to the Constitution that would allow for the automatic selection of an acting Prime Minister. He acted again in August, while the Prime Minister went to New York on a business trip; and again in October, while she attended the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Australia.
Dookeran took the reins again in November of last year while the country was under a State of Emergency.
Works Minister Jack Warner, who is also the chairman of the United National Congress, first took the position in April 2011 while Persad-Bissessar attended the Organisation of American States Summit in Washington, DC.
He took it up again in July, when she attended a Caricom meeting in Jamaica; and again in September, for two days, as the Prime Minister attended a UN conference on Non-Communicable Diseases at the UN headquarters in New York.
At the start of December 2011, COP leader Prakash Ramadhar got his turn at the wheel while the Prime Minister was in Venezuela for the Summit of Caricom and Latin American leaders.
