Treasurer’s report
Interim Executive, 2023-2025

I’m not sure that two years is really an “interim” term of office, and I take some of the blame for how long its taken to get to this point, calling on the media corps to choose an executive to take it forward to the next stage of its development.

I’d hoped to be more effective in making that happen. I joined MATT’s executive on October 02, 2021 as a floor member with the goal of creating a website to act as an online focus for the association’s activities and create an institutional history.

On December 13, Kalain Hosein, the executive’s treasurer, resigned along with Asha Javeed and Laura Dowrich-Phillips and I was asked to take over the role of treasurer.

What I discovered then is that a fundamental change in law instituted in 2019 meant that any functioning association with a bank account had to present itself along very specific legal lines.

MATT has not had access to its accounts since I have been treasurer. The executive has managed, through the patience of accountant Andrew Sambrano, to achieve NGO status for MATT and is registered as NPO N2023100500006.

I’d begun collecting the paperwork necessary to regain access to our First Citizen’s and Unit Trust accounts when life and time overtook me and I could no longer keep pace with what was required to complete this task.

That means that the incoming executive has a choice to make. It can complete the registration and documentation process, understanding that MATT must operate under more stringent business principles or it can allow its registration to eventually be struck from the registry.

I sincerely hope that a fresh executive with energy and focus will complete this task and put MATT on a more powerful and robust footing.

Completing this process is not simply a matter of getting access to bank accounts, an NGO/NPO operates in a very different space when it comes to raising funds and accessing grant money.

In my first year as treasurer, we were offered fifty thousand euros by the European Union, but to access it, we had to navigate a torturous grant qualification process. As a registered NGO/NPO, part of that work would already have been done.

Then president Ira Mathur initiated work on the EU grant project; however, the conditions required for eligibility, including NGO status and funded operational capacity, were not yet in place.

This is not a slight. It is a signal that the incoming executive must be ready embrace a new approach to the oversight of MATT and its role in guarding the fourth estate in Trinidad and Tobago and sharpening the skills of working journalists.

To proceed with the work of MATT over the last five years, a system of IOUs was instituted as a promise to repay spending made by members of the executive to implement projects and initiatives.

Debts

December 19, 2022, IOU to James Saunders in the sum of TT$2,000 to cover the cost of incidentals related to the hosting of a post-Covid Media Association lime held at the BMobile box at the Oval.

December 19, 2022, IOU to Ira Mathur in the sum of TT$3,000 to cover the cost of incidentals related to the hosting of a post-Covid Media Association lime held at the BMobile box at the Oval.

March 08, 2023, IOU of $400 to repay Kandace Jackson, vice-president, who represented MATT at an ACM meeting in Guyana for the cost of her ticket from Tobago to Trinidad (ACM covered the ticket from Trinidad to Guyana and hotel costs)

March 08, 2023, IOU of US$300 to repay Ira Mathur president, who forwarded this money to Kandace Jackson as a per diem for her travel and stay in Guyana representing MATT

December 28, 2023, Invoice 3068 to ARCS Financial Consultants (Andrew Sambrano) for services related to registration of MATT as an NGO-NPO in the sum of TT$5,000.

Total unpaid debts: TT$12,070

Assets
FCB Account: $122,680.36
Unit Trust Account: 1,453 units

Thank you for the opportunity to serve.

Mark Lyndersay

Outgoing treasurer, January 10, 2026.