A sharp political backlash has hit the ruling administration of Trinidad and Tobago over its stewardship of the country’s critical energy industry, with former energy minister Stuart Young leveling sweeping accusations of incompetence, policy missteps and regulatory negligence that he warns threaten thousands of jobs, critical foreign exchange revenue and long-term investor confidence. Young made the allegations public in a detailed Facebook post published over the weekend, targeting both Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissesar and current Energy Minister Dr Roodal Moonilal for a series of missteps that have already disrupted operations at the country’s key Point Lisas Industrial Estate, where major global petrochemical players operate.
At the core of Young’s criticism is the government’s revised natural gas allocation policy, which he argues has diverted critical gas supplies away from established ammonia and methanol producers at Point Lisas to Atlantic LNG, a move driven purely by the short-term appeal of elevated global LNG prices. Young calls this decision a short-sighted and fundamentally flawed policy that has already forced operational shutdowns at a nitrogen plant run by Nutrien, one of the world’s largest fertiliser manufacturers, and prompted major methanol producer Methanex to issue explicit warnings that it could be forced to shutter its operations next if the current policy framework remains in place.
Young emphasized that the current administration’s mismanagement unfolded in less than a year in office, tying the industrial disruptions directly to what he describes as the government’s fundamental ignorance of how the energy sector operates, as well as eroded business confidence among international investors that have long anchored Trinidad and Tobago’s industrial energy economy. “In less than a year Kamla Persad-Bissesar’s incompetence and mismanagement of the energy sector has led to the shut-down of the plants of one of the largest global fertiliser companies Nutrien, at Pt Lisas, and now one of the largest global methanol producers Methanex is signalling that they may follow suit,” Young wrote in his post.
Beyond the gas allocation controversy, Young also took aim at Moonilal over the delayed response to an offshore oil spill in the Gulf of Paria first detected on May 1. He accused the minister of failing to detect and disclose the spill for nine days, noting that the incident was only publicly confirmed by the Trinidad and Tobago government after Venezuelan authorities exposed the spill. “It is clear that Moonilal has no say—in fact, sadly, as Minister of Energy he did not even know the oil assets under his stewardship were responsible for an oil spill on May 1 and it took the Venezuelans exposing the spill for the government to tell us today, May 10 (9 days later), that there was an offshore oil spill. Total incompetence or dishonesty,” Young said.
Young also raised serious legal questions about the leadership of the National Gas Company (NGC), the state-owned entity responsible for managing the country’s gas supplies, arguing that the board and senior management will face fiduciary legal scrutiny over the controversial policy shifts that have triggered the industrial shutdowns. “Furthermore, the board at NGC has serious legal questions to answer as in a few short months under their tenure major petroleum chemical companies at Pt Lisas have shut down and are indicating further shut downs which are due to the change in gas allocation policies at NGC. These decisions will be subject to legal fiduciary scrutiny of the board and management at NGC,” he added.
Closing his statement, Young left a provocative question for both the administration and the public of Trinidad and Tobago, challenging the government’s record on one of the country’s most economically vital sectors: “So once again Trinidad and Tobago, who exactly is winning?” Young warned that if the current policy course is not reversed, the full consequences will be felt across the national economy: permanent job losses at Point Lisas, permanent reductions in critical foreign exchange earnings, collapse of local service companies that support the petrochemical sector, and a lasting drought of foreign direct investment in the country’s energy industry.