Yvonne Webb

Just over a month be­fore the Con­gress of the Peo­ple (COP) holds its in­ter­nal elec­tions, five more con­stituen­cies are en­dors­ing the re­turn of Win­ston Dook­er­an to take com­mand of the par­ty.Chair­men from four con­stituen­cies say there is too much di­vi­sion and in-fight­ing with­in the par­ty and on­ly Dook­er­an, who has across-the-board ap­peal, can bring about the sta­bil­i­ty need­ed to guide the par­ty in­to the 2015 gen­er­al elec­tion.The COP is the sec­ond largest mem­ber of the Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar-led gov­ern­ment.The five have at­tached their sig­na­tures to a let­ter, is­sued yes­ter­day, call­ing for its cur­rent leader Prakash Ra­mad­har, who is al­so the Min­is­ter of Le­gal Af­fairs in the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship Gov­ern­ment, to stand aside and let Dook­er­an as­sume the lead­er­ship po­si­tion once more.

They have made it clear they are do­ing so in their per­son­al ca­pac­i­ties."To­day, more than ever, the COP and the coun­try need per­son­al­i­ties who rep­re­sent sta­bil­i­ty, re­spect and in­tegri­ty," the signed let­ter said.It added: "It is com­mon knowl­edge that for quite some time all has not been well with­in the COP. There has been much di­vi­sion and in-fight­ing. Mem­bers of the par­ty have the high­est lev­el of re­spect for Mr Dook­er­an."We are con­fi­dent that should he re­turn as leader, his re­turn would have a calm­ing and unit­ing ef­fect on the par­ty and al­low it to fo­cus on the de­liv­ery of de­cent and re­spon­si­ble gov­er­nance."The let­ter con­tin­ued that through­out Dook­er­an's ca­reer in pub­lic life, he had dis­played "the high­est lev­el of so­bri­ety, in­tel­lec­tu­al­ism and car­ing, as well as pure and hon­est lead­er­ship."

Dook­er­an, the For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter, is out of the coun­try but in an in­ter­view with the Sun­day Guardian ear­li­er this month he con­firmed he had been ap­proached to take con­trol of the par­ty and had a dis­cus­sion with Ra­mad­har about the is­sues brought to his at­ten­tion.At that point he did not ex­press any de­sire to re­turn as leader of the par­ty he found­ed, opt­ing in­stead to in­di­cate he would se­ri­ous­ly con­sid­er it if that was what the mem­ber­ship want­ed.COP's nom­i­na­tion day is June 6 at the par­ty's Op­er­a­tion's Cen­tre, Char­lieville.A COP source said sev­er­al oth­er mem­bers are in­ter­est­ed in con­test­ing the lead­er­ship of the par­ty on­ly if Dook­er­an re­fused to ac­cept the chal­lenge."Right now the calls are be­com­ing more nu­mer­ous and the voic­es are get­ting loud­er. Once Mr Dook­er­an ac­cepts, the oth­er chal­lengers will stand aside," the source added.

Who's back­ing Dook­er­an?

�2 Ri­car­do Ram­bal­ly of Tu­na­puna.

�2 Ra­bindranath Ram­lo­gan of Fyz­abad.

�2 Trevor Bridglals­ingh of Ch­agua­nas East.

�2 Rudolph Hanamji of Diego Mar­tin West.

�2 Vice-chair­man Hugh Nurse of St Joseph.