Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar dropped a bomb­shell yes­ter­day when she pro­duced a $5 mil­lion cheque writ­ten out to the Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment by for­mer CL Fi­nan­cial chair­man Lawrence Duprey. Per­sad-Bisses­sar, waved a copy of cheque dat­ed June 10, 2007, in front of thou­sands of sup­port­ers at Mid Cen­tre Mall's carpark, Ch­agua­nas, and called on PNM of­fi­cials to ex­plain it.

She point­ed to the tim­ing of the pay­ment of the $5 mil­lion, the col­lapse of CL Fi­nan­cial and the fi­nan­cial gi­ant's sub­se­quent bailout un­der the for­mer Patrick Man­ning-led ad­min­is­tra­tion. "When the PNM bailed out CL Fi­nan­cial was that pay­back for this $5 mil­lion? Fi­nance Min­is­ter Lar­ry Howai said it was a $19 bil­lion pay­out on the Cli­co fi­as­co by the PNM," she de­clared.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said af­ter PNM leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley ac­cused the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress of re­ceiv­ing a $2.4 mil­lion cheque for par­ty fi­nances, she caused UNC chair­man Jack Warn­er to launch an in­ves­ti­ga­tion at the par­ty's head­quar­ters to search for the cheque. She said no such cheque was found. Per­sad-Bisses­sar knocked the me­dia, which she said is be­ing used by groups that are not in­ter­est­ed in the "de­vel­op­ment" of T&T.