PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Guardian -  - Dr Keith Rowley says yesterday’s Cabinet reshuffle by Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar was the clearest evidence of her People’s Partnership Government’s collapse in office, adding a return to the polls was the only option for T&T. “The Government has collapsed and the Prime Minister is totally out of her depth. The recent statement and Cabinet reshuffle provides all the proof we need,” Rowley said in a statement yesterday.
He said Persad-Bissessar was “a lame duck, operating now on incredulous utterances and insulting assertions.” Three major Cabinet reshuffles in just over 36 months, he said, “are evidence of a leader that is floundering.” Rowley said Persad-Bissessar’s Cabinet now has 41 ministers, the largest number in the nation’s history. “New ministries are invented, others are chopped up willy-nilly and still no one can justify these changes which cost the taxpayer unnecessary tens of millions,” he added.

He said the United States has the equivalent of 22 Cabinet members serving a population of 314 million people. “We are of the view that the size of the Cabinet and the number of ministers are absurd,” he said. Rowley said it was clear “we are in the throes of the most severe political and governance crisis that our country has ever seen. The country has lost all confidence in this Government and this Prime Minister.”