PNM Po­lit­i­cal leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley is urg­ing del­e­gates vot­ing in the par­ty's March 20 ex­ec­u­tive elec­tion to give him a team that rep­re­sents all ages, with ex­pe­ri­enced peo­ple not on­ly from To­ba­go, but all over the coun­try."I am ask­ing the del­e­gates to be re­spon­si­ble... Look at the can­di­dates and se­lect that group of peo­ple who can tru­ly rep­re­sent the par­ty at this time," he told ap­prox­i­mate­ly 300 par­ty mem­bers, sup­port­ers and friends at the an­nu­al con­fer­ence of the PNM To­ba­go coun­cil on Sun­day at Ma­son Hall Sec­ondary School.Row­ley said if he got a bal­anced ex­ec­u­tive, the PNM would be in the best po­si­tion to deal with the Gov­ern­ment.

"Whether we in gov­ern­ment or op­po­si­tion we are pre­pared to serve the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go," he said."When we come out of Ch­aguara­mas on March 20 with a na­tion­al ex­ec­u­tive that rep­re­sents all ages, ex­pe­ri­enced peo­ple, from To­ba­go, from south, from east, from cen­tral, from Port-of-Spain, we can show the peo­ple and the coun­try that this is the PNM and it tru­ly rep­re­sents Trinidad and To­ba­go." Row­ley told the del­e­gates the mat­ter was in their hands, and if they failed the par­ty would end up in op­po­si­tion for ten years.

He said if they want­ed the best chance to win the next gen­er­al elec­tion they must give him an ex­ec­u­tive of peo­ple who would work on the pro­grammes that had start­ed."This mat­ter is in the hands of the del­e­gates. You have one vote, I want you to use it wise­ly," he stressed.He de­scribed the eight-month-old Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship Gov­ern­ment as one of "lies, de­ceit and dis­re­spect" and an "em­bar­rass­ment to the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go."He said he want­ed to ask Mi­nor­i­ty Leader Ash­worth Jack if he sup­port­ed this and whether the peo­ple of To­ba­go vot­ed for this.

He said un­til the Gov­ern­ment owned up and told the peo­ple of the coun­try how Resh­mi Ram­nar­ine end­ed up as head of the Se­cu­ri­ty In­tel­li­gence Agency (SIA) it would not go away.Row­ley al­so warned the Gov­ern­ment not to in­ter­fere with the re­sults of the last THA elec­tion be­cause the PNM was ready to take on that bat­tle.Present at the con­fer­ence were Colm Im­bert, Sen­a­tor Pene­lope Beck­les-Robin­son, Eu­dine Job-Davis and Franklin Khan, all can­di­dates in the ex­ec­u­tive elec­tion.Ear­li­er in the con­fer­ence, all eight mem­bers of the coun­cil's ex­ec­u­tive were elect­ed un­op­posed.

They are Neil Wil­son, chair­man; Wen­dell Berkley, vice-chair­man; Yolan­da George-Reid, sec­re­tary; Joel Jack, as­sis­tant sec­re­tary; Ter­rence Williams, trea­sur­er; Dr Denise Tsoi-a-Fatt-An­gus, PRO; Ren­nie Du­mas, ed­u­ca­tion of­fi­cer; and Kelvin Charles, re­search of­fi­cer.Deputy po­lit­i­cal leader (To­ba­go af­fairs) Orville Lon­don said as he looked around the coun­try he saw "blun­der af­ter blun­der, mis­step af­ter mis­step."He ac­cused the gov­ern­ment of de­ceit, dis­hon­esty and dis­re­spect."We in To­ba­go have that re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to stop them now," he said.