For­mer Na­tion­al Al­liance for Re­con­struc­tion (NAR) min­is­ter, Dr Em­manuel Ho­sein, says he be­lieves the tim­ing of the Ju­ly 1990 at­tempt­ed takeover of the coun­try was in­flu­enced by PNM peo­ple.Ho­sein made the dis­clo­sure as he gave ev­i­dence be­fore the com­mis­sion of en­quiry in­to the event at the Caribbean Court of Jus­tice in Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day."In my mind it was in­flu­enced by per­sons whose in­ter­est was the wel­fare of the PNM."

Asked by the com­mis­sion's lead coun­sel, Avory Sinanan, if he felt the at­tempt­ed coup was to stop the de­bate in Par­lia­ment at the time on cor­rup­tion by the pre­vi­ous PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion, Ho­sein replied: "I be­lieve that...I have come to that con­clu­sion in my mind."Ho­sein said he heard that Ja­maat al Mus­limeen in­sur­gents, who staged the 1990 up­ris­ing, had made threats to the for­mer PNM gov­ern­ment over the land is­sue at Mu­cu­rapo.

He not­ed, how­ev­er, when the Mus­limeen staged the coup d'etat, their main grouse was that the NAR gov­ern­ment was wicked.Ho­sein told the com­mis­sion that the up­ris­ing had noth­ing to do with army troops be­ing sta­tioned near the Ja­maat's Mu­cu­rapo com­pound ei­ther.He said the in­sur­gents had Ruger range ri­fles and AK 47s which they had ob­tained long be­fore.

"They had to have been plot­ting some kind of ac­tion," Ho­sein said.Ho­sein, re­spond­ing to ques­tions, said the then na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty coun­cil dealt with such mat­ters.Told that Robin­son, dur­ing his tes­ti­mo­ny, said there was no such coun­cil at the time, Ho­sein said there was an arrange­ment where­by the prime min­is­ter met with the na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty min­is­ter and the head of se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies on a reg­u­lar ba­sis.

Ho­sein said Mus­limeen in­sur­gents, dur­ing the Red House at­tack, where he was a hostage, kept re­fer­ring to forces out­side whom they said would come to their aid."You'll see," Ho­sein said, they kept say­ing.He said Bakr came to him to do­nate med­i­cine for the hos­pi­tals an or­gan­i­sa­tion abroad had sent.Ho­sein said he went to Robin­son to ask him if he would ac­cept it and Robin­son asked him if he was crazy. (YB)