The Chief Secretary of Tobago is the leader of the Tobagonian

Government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...

. The Chief Secretary chairs the Tobagonian Cabinet and is primarily responsible for the formulation, development and presentation of Tobagonian Government policy. Additional functions of the Chief Secretary include promoting and representing Tobago in an official capacity, at home and abroad, and responsibility for constitutional affairs, as they relate to devolution and the Tobagonian Government. The Chief Secretary is a Member of the

Assembly Assembly may refer to: Organisations and meetings * Deliberative assembly, a gathering of members who use parliamentary procedure for making decisions * General assembly, an official meeting of the members of an organization or of their representa ...

, and is nominated by the

Tobago House of Assembly The Tobago House of Assembly (THA) is a unicameral devolved legislative body responsible for the island of Tobago within the unitary state of Trinidad and Tobago. The THA was re-established in 1980

before bring officially appointed by the

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) *President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...

. Members of the Tobagonian Cabinet as well as councilors of the Tobagonian Government are appointed by the Chief Secretary. As head of the Tobagonian Government, the Chief Secretary is directly accountable to the Tobago House of Assembly for their actions and the actions of the Tobagonian Government. The official office of the Chief Secretary is in Calder Hall Road,

Scarborough, Tobago Scarborough is a major city of the Island of Tobago as well as the eleventh-most-populous in Trinidad and Tobago. Scarborough was the capital of Tobago in 1769 before it was unified with Trinidad changing the capital to Port of Spain. Situated in ...

as well as the

on Jermingham Street. The current Chief Secretary of the Tobago House of Assembly is Mr. Farley Chavez Augustine of the Progressive Democratic Patriots, he assumed the chair on December 9, 2021.

Election and term

The Chief Secretary is almost always the leader of the largest party, or the leader of the senior partner in any majority

coalition A coalition is a group formed when two or more people or groups temporarily work together to achieve a common goal. The term is most frequently used to denote a formation of power in political or economical spaces. Formation According to ''A Gui ...

. There is no term of office for a Chief Secretary. In practice, they hold office as long as they retain the confidence of the chamber; indeed, they are required to either resign or seek a parliamentary dissolution (and with it, new elections) if his or her government "no longer enjoys the confidence of the Parliament." Whenever the office of Chief Secretary falls vacant, the President is responsible for appointing the new incumbent; the appointment is formalised at a meeting between the President and the Chief Secretary designate. If an incumbent Chief Secretary is defeated in a general election, they do not immediately vacate office. The Chief Secretary only leaves office when the

nominates a successor individual. The period in office of a Chief Secretary is not linked to the term of

members of the Tobago House of Assembly Member may refer to: * Military jury, referred to as "Members" in military jargon * Element (mathematics), an object that belongs to a mathematical set * In object-oriented programming, a member of a class ** Field (computer science), entries in ...

. A maximum four-year term is set for each session of Parliament. Parliament can be dissolved and an extraordinary general election held, before the expiration of the four-year term. The Chief Secretary, once appointed continues in office as the head of the devolved Tobago House of Assembly until either resignation, dismissal, or death. Resignation can be triggered off by the passage of a

Motion of No Confidence A motion of no confidence, also variously called a vote of no confidence, no-confidence motion, motion of confidence, or vote of confidence, is a statement or vote about whether a person in a position of responsibility like in government or mana ...

in the Chief Secretary or the Tobagonian Government or by rejecting a Motion of Confidence in the Tobago House of Assembly. In those situations, the Chief Secretary must tender their resignation and the resignation of their government to the president. In such circumstances, the Presiding Officer appoints an interim Chief Secretary, until the Tobago House of Assembly determines on a new nominee to be presented to the President for formal appointment.

Nomination and appointment

Candidates for the position of Chief Secretary are nominated by the

from among its assembly members at the beginning of each term. The members

elect An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operated ...

the nominee for the Chief Secretary by majority vote. If no one is elected by a majority of votes cast with the first set of nominations, the process continues until a majority decide to cast their vote for one candidate. This process does not require an

absolute majority A supermajority, supra-majority, qualified majority, or special majority is a requirement for a proposal to gain a specified level of support which is greater than the threshold of more than one-half used for a simple majority. Supermajority ru ...

of the Assembly (currently 7 out of 12 members). Once this process has occurred the Presiding Officer shall formally send a letter to the incumbent President who must then appoint that nominee to the position of Chief Secretary.

List of Chief Secretaries of Tobago

Below is a list of office-holders:

Timeline of Chief Secretaries

ImageSize = width:1350 height:auto barincrement:12 PlotArea = top:10 bottom:100 right:130 left:20 AlignBars = late DateFormat = yyyy Period = from:1980 till:2023 TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:5 start:1980 Colors = id:PNM value:rgb(0.86,0.08,0.18) legend: Tobago_Council_of_the_People's_National_Movement id:PDP value:rgb(0.20,0.80,0.20) legend: Progressive_Democratic_Patriots id:NAR value:rgb(0.91,0.36,0.29) legend: National_Alliance_for_Reconstruction id:DAC value:rgb(0.67,0.00,0.83) legend: Democratic_Action_Congress id:Ind value:rgb(0.87,0.87,0.87) legend:Independent Legend = columns:1 left:150 top:50 columnwidth:100 TextData = pos:(20,55) textcolor:black fontsize:L text:"Political parties:" BarData = bar:Robinson bar:Davidson bar:Denoon bar:HCharles bar:London bar:Davidson-Celestine bar:KCharles bar:Jack bar:Dennis bar:Augustine PlotData= width:5 align:left fontsize:S shift:(5,-4) anchor:till bar:Robinson from: 1980 till: 1986 color:DAC from: 1986 till: 1986 color:NAR text:" ANR Robinson" bar:Davidson from: 1986 till: 1989 color:NAR text:"Jefferson Davidson" bar:Denoon from: 1989 till: 1996 color:NAR text:"Lennox Denoon" bar:HCharles from: 1996 till: 2001 color:NAR text:"Hochoy Charles" bar:London from: 2001 till: 2016 color:PNM from: 2016 till: 2017 color:PNM text:"Orville London" bar:KCharles from: 2017 till: 2020 color:PNM text:"Kelvin Charles" bar:Jack from: 2020 till: 2020 color:PNM text:"Joel Jack" bar:Dennis from: 2020 till: 2021 color:PNM text:"Ancil Dennis" bar:Augustine from: 2021 till: 2022 color:PDP from: 2022 till: end color:Ind text:"Farley Chavez Augustine"

Previous nominating elections

Living former Chief Secretaries

There are four living former Chief Secretaries and two living former acting Chief Secretaries:

References

{{reflist Politics of Trinidad and Tobago *List Lists of political office-holders in Trinidad and Tobago