The knots of union: Administrative challenges

Dr Rita Pemberton

WHEN THE colony of Trinidad and Tobago was created, two island units with different historical experiences were brought together in a union that was devoid of any mechanism to facilitate integration of the two.

The colony was divided into eight administrative districts called counties, which were subdivided into wards. Tobago, which was administered as a ward in the County of St David, was commonly referred to as “the island ward.”

This led to two inaccurate perceptions of Tobago, which have dogged the island in its relationship with Trinidad.

In the first place, the ward status was not viewed as that of an administrative district in the united colony. Instead, the island was commonly described as “a ward of Trinidad,” and this ward was perceived to be a dependent of the larger and wealthier island.

These inaccuracies, which provided the first of several knots in the relationship between Trinidad and Tobago, needed to be corrected.

These notions were fuelled by the circumstances which led to the union. The demise of the Tobago sugar industry in the 1880s created severe financial problems for the island’s administration. With plantations out of business, there was a sharp decline in revenue, because plantation owners who were the main contributors to the island’s revenue were unable to pay their taxes.

In addition, the decline of the industry resulted in a reduction of shipping and trade, which were closely related to it. This also meant a reduction of customs and excise duties, which constituted an important source of revenue.

The outcome was that the island’s Treasury was unable to meet its administrative costs and there were constant requests for assistance from the imperial government to support strategies intended to boost the sugar industry and assist the colony’s development programmes.

The imperial administration, with its fixation on colonies as providers of profits, was unwavering in its position that it would not take on colonial financial burdens and mandated the island’s administration to implement cost-cutting measures.

The imperial body set the tone by reducing its own costs and, in the process, added to those of the financially challenged island by insisting the salary of the governor, an imperial representative, formerly borne by the imperial authorities, was the responsibility of the colony. This decision was made without any consideration for the island’s dire economic circumstances.

The next step was the demotion of Tobago’s chief administrator from governor to a lower-paid official, who was called the warden/magistrate. Reflected in this position was another strategy of the imperial authorities to reduce the number of officials employed in the colony by combining responsibilities and reducing salaries.

This system did not make for effectiveness, because the reduced number of officials was overworked and could not carry out their responsibilities with any measure of efficiency.

In addition, due consideration was not given to the island’s geography: the locations of some communities and the state of the roads made those combinations unworkable.

The warden/magistrate was required to function as warden administering to the needs of all the districts on the island and at the same time manage all facets of the legal system.

The first problem to be overcome was the lack of clarity about his status and his powers. While over the years some wardens/magistrates assumed they held powers like those of the governor, and behaved in that manner, they only possessed authority over those people who worked in the offices over which they exercised control.

Secondly, the island did not have a properly developed system of roads, which made it difficult for the warden to deal with the problems which faced some communities, particularly those on the windward side. This was particularly aggravating to the people of Tobago and their representatives.

Thirdly, the early holders of this combined office had no legal training and were not able to dispense justice in a satisfactory manner. One warden/magistrate was unable to manage the court operations and could not keep order in the court.

Fourthly, there were instances when clashes occurred in the two positions. When the warden/magistrate was required to give evidence in court as warden, a magistrate had to be sent from Trinidad to try the case. Given the state of communications between the two islands, this arrangement was not practical.

Fifth, the warden/magistrate was also required to carry out other functions. He served as inspector of schools, commissioner of the Supreme Court, commissioner of affidavits and sub-registrar.

In serving in all these different capacities, the warden/magistrate was allocated only one clerk to assist, who was also overburdened. It could not be expected that all these functions would be carried out satisfactorily and therefore there were many complaints about the poor performance of the warden/magistrate, which provided another source of frustration for the population and conveyed the notion of an uncaring administration – another knot in the relationship of the islands.

On the island there was disagreement about the combination of the jobs, each with heavy responsibilities, in one office-holder.

This arrangement meant there were few people in the administration, with responsibilities that were too extensive, with the result that some matters received minimal attention and others none at all.

There were questions over the rationality of allocating the wide powers held by the warden/magistrate to one individual, and, as demonstrated by the open expressions of dissatisfaction with their operations, this did not benefit the people of Tobago.

There was dissatisfaction with the system in which heads of department, based in Trinidad, did not visit Tobago often enough, so poor supervision and poor service characterised these departments, over which the warden/magistrate had no control. This supported the conviction that effective administration of Tobago should be best achieved with a staff located on the island and empowered to make decisions.

The administration of Tobago under the warden/magistrate proved very unsatisfactory. Many problems were not addressed and decision-makers in Trinidad did not see a need for any special provisions to be made for Tobago, which was viewed like any other ward in the colony.

Dissatisfaction with the system led to calls for decentralisation of the administration to remove the controls by people from Trinidad, who did not possess an intimate knowledge of Tobago and its needs.

There was conviction that a system in which decision-making was based on the island was essential to Tobago’s development. This became a central plank in the impassioned arguments expressed by the island’s popular representatives and members of the underserved communities in their campaigns for change.

The response from the administration was to change the job title to commissioner and warden, but the functions of warden/magistrate remained, the appointees continued to be outsiders, problems festered beyond the second half of the 20th century; and the belief that Tobago’s problems would be best handled by Tobagonians became a tight knot which was engrained in the psyche of the population.

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