Richard?Lord

Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) op­er­a­tions of­fi­cer Irene Hinds says there is no plot against in­cum­bent Diego Mar­tin Cen­tral MP Dr Amery Browne.

Hinds, who is al­so a Diego Mar­tin Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion (DM­RC) al­der­man, made the com­ment dur­ing an in­ter­view at Bal­isi­er House, Port-of-Spain, yes­ter­day, in re­sponse to a sto­ry pub­lished in yes­ter­day's is­sue of this news­pa­per which raised the is­sue in the wake of the re­jec­tion of Browne.

Both Browne and DM­RC chair­man Dar­ryl Smith were among nom­i­nees re­ject­ed at an ear­li­er screen­ing ex­er­cise on April 2, but in a third screen­ing on Mon­day, Smith was se­lect­ed.

Sources close to Browne, who did not re­ceive a sin­gle vote from the con­stituen­cy screen­ing com­mit­tee, claimed on Tues­day that the se­lec­tion of Smith as the can­di­date for the con­stituen­cy seat in the 2015 gen­er­al elec­tion was part of an al­leged plot against Browne or­ches­trat­ed by Hinds.

But Hinds, who is al­so vice chair­man of the Diego Mar­tin Cen­tral con­stituen­cy, dis­missed the sug­ges­tion yes­ter­day, say­ing it was her par­ty group which nom­i­nat­ed Browne as the can­di­date in 2007. She re­called, how­ev­er, that in the in­ter­nal elec­tion for the con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive in 2012, Browne's slate did not in­clude her as a can­di­date.

Hinds said when she saw Browne's slate, she ap­proached Browne at Bal­isi­er House and said: "'But wait, Dr Browne, how my name is not on the list?'"

She said Browne re­spond­ed: "'Nah, don't take it per­son­al.'"

Hinds said she did not take it per­son­al­ly, adding that his slate was de­feat­ed and she be­came vice chair­man of the con­stituen­cy.

"If I didn't take that per­son­al, then he shouldn't take this per­son­al," Hinds added yes­ter­day.

Deal­ing with as­pects of the screen­ing, Hinds said her par­ty group did not nom­i­nate any­one for the first screen­ing on April 2. She said for the sec­ond screen­ing one week lat­er, it rec­om­mend­ed Shari Reynold, who wasn't cho­sen. She said her group did not nom­i­nate any­one for last Mon­day's screen­ing.

Hinds said: "When we went for screen­ing on Mon­day the ex­ec­u­tive of the con­stituen­cy had its meet­ing and the vote was nine for Dar­ryl Smith."

With­out elab­o­rat­ing, Hinds said she then "went in­to the back­room (at Bal­isi­er House) and we had our dis­cus­sions, and com­ing out of the dis­cus­sions in the back­room there was a re­sult and that is the end of the sto­ry, the par­ty done with that, the ship sail...time to move on."

Some­body else's turn

Re­it­er­at­ing her sup­port of Browne in 2007, Hinds said, "It is my right if I feel now I don't want to sup­port (him). I can sup­port any­body I want. The par­ty con­sti­tu­tion says each par­ty group is en­ti­tled to nom­i­nate some­body, which means me."

She said she had no is­sue "with any­one say­ing things about me be­cause I am in pub­lic life and I am not fenced round."

Hinds added: "Dr Browne is a mem­ber of the PNM so I have the ut­most re­spect for him. He served his time and prob­a­bly it is some­body's else time now and there is plen­ty of room in the PNM for Dr Browne. I will work along­side him any­time."

Ad­dress­ing her po­si­tion on the par­ty's screen­ing com­mit­tee, Hinds said she qual­i­fied be­cause of her ex­ec­u­tive po­si­tion in the par­ty. She said her daugh­ter Kel­lane, who is a mem­ber of the con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive, was not at Mon­day's screen­ing.

She al­so de­nied that she pre­vent­ed par­ty group 15 from hav­ing its AGM last year. She said the chair­man of the group, in a let­ter, said it was not pos­si­ble to have the meet­ing as cer­tain is­sues had to be ad­dressed in the group it­self.

Hinds al­so de­nied that cer­tain mem­bers of the con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive were em­ployed in the Diego Mar­tin Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion.

She ad­mit­ted, how­ev­er, that her daugh­ter, Kel­lane, had been work­ing in the cor­po­ra­tion for 15 years.

Browne could not be reached for com­ment yes­ter­day.