AN­GE­LO JE­DIDI­AH

Re­porter

an­ge­lo.je­didi­ah@guardian.co.tt

En­er­gy Min­is­ter Stu­art Young’s im­pend­ing ac­ces­sion to the role of prime min­is­ter has been met with im­mense pride by mem­bers of the Chi­na So­ci­ety.

At this year’s an­nu­al Chi­nese Spring Fes­ti­val Fair, the de­ci­sion by the par­lia­men­tary cau­cus of the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment to vote for Young to be prime min­is­ter, when Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley steps down, was de­scribed as a his­toric event. The de­ci­sion was sup­port­ed at the par­ty’s gen­er­al coun­cil meet­ing.

Speak­ing at the two-day cel­e­bra­tions at the An­chor­age in Ch­aguara­mas, Chi­na So­ci­ety pres­i­dent Charles Cheng praised Young’s an­tic­i­pat­ed ap­point­ment, wish­ing him the best in his fu­ture en­deav­ours.

“Al­low me to take this op­por­tu­ni­ty to recog­nise the his­toric achieve­ment of a mem­ber of our com­mu­ni­ty with Chi­nese her­itage. I re­fer to the Ho­n­ourable Stu­art Young SC, who will be our next Prime Min­is­ter,” Cheng said. 

“Min­is­ter Young quite right­ly refers to him­self as a Trin­bag­on­ian. He is of Chi­nese her­itage and we the Chi­nese com­mu­ni­ty are very proud of him. We wish him all the best as he takes Trinidad and To­ba­go for­ward.”

Over the week­end, hun­dreds vis­it­ed the Chi­nese New Year cel­e­bra­tions to ex­pe­ri­ence Chi­nese arts, cul­ture, and drag­on boat rac­ing.

Chargé d’Af­faires at the Em­bassy of the Peo­ple’s Re­pub­lic of Chi­na in T&T, Yang Han, host­ed a num­ber of gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials at the event, in­clud­ing Sen­ate Pres­i­dent Nigel de Fre­itas and House Speak­er Bridgid An­nisette-George. Young and Prime Min­is­ter Row­ley were not in at­ten­dance.

Al­so speak­ing at the event, For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Dr Amery Browne shared that Chi­na and T&T con­tin­ue to main­tain strong diplo­mat­ic re­la­tions span­ning 50 years.

He said he ex­pects bi­lat­er­al re­la­tions to deep­en and strength­en.

“We de­pend, we are de­pen­dant on the ex­cel­lence of our re­la­tions with im­por­tant part­ners such as the Peo­ple’s Re­pub­lic of Chi­na…long may it live,” said Browne.

The For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter al­so said that there will soon be the in­tro­duc­tion of Chi­nese en­ter­tain­ment pro­gram­ming to be aired on lo­cal tele­vi­sion, as part of both coun­tries’ ef­forts to con­tin­ue pro­pelling mu­tu­al cul­tur­al col­lab­o­ra­tion.

“I want to wish that the next 12 months, the Year of the Snake brings good for­tune to all of us, Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Peo­ple’s Re­pub­lic of Chi­na.”