Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior Re­porter

jesse.ramdeo@cnc3.co.tt

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath has thrown his full sup­port be­hind Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) po­lit­i­cal leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, re­ject­ing spec­u­la­tion that he har­bours lead­er­ship am­bi­tions ahead of the par­ty’s forth­com­ing in­ter­nal elec­tion.

“With­out a doubt, Mrs Per­sad-Bisses­sar is the undis­put­ed leader now and for sev­er­al years to come,” Padarath told Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day in re­sponse to queries about whether he had such am­bi­tion.

Dur­ing the UNC’s Mon­day Night Re­port in Pe­nal, Per­sad-Bisses­sar de­clared her in­ten­tion to run for the po­si­tion she has held since 2010, af­ter putting the par­ty on no­tice that the elec­tion was close.

“The Na­tex will meet this week to de­cide on the date for the in­ter­nal elec­tion of the po­lit­i­cal leader. I in­tend to con­test for the po­si­tion of po­lit­i­cal leader. Any mem­ber of the UNC can file a nom­i­na­tion for the po­si­tion of po­lit­i­cal leader. If you want it, come and take it; I will be wait­ing,” Per­sad-Bisses­sar told sup­port­ers.

Yes­ter­day, Padarath sig­nalled that he has no in­ten­tion to chal­lenge for the po­si­tion, de­spite spec­u­la­tion that he was a can­di­date to suc­ceed Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

“I have been one of Mrs Bisses­sar’s most vo­cif­er­ous ad­vo­cates in terms of sup­port for her lead­er­ship. That has not changed. I am sure the whole par­ty is back­ing Mrs Per­sad-Bisses­sar,” he said, adding the UNC is in a “very good po­si­tion” un­der her lead­er­ship.

Not­ing that “the or­gans of the par­ty are ac­tive and ro­bust,” Padarath added, “De­spite the de­mo­c­ra­t­ic process, I think any­one chal­leng­ing Mrs Per­sad-Bisses­sar would be fool­ish to do so. Mrs Per­sad-Bisses­sar has the sup­port of the rank and file of our par­ty and has demon­strat­ed that she has what it takes to lead us for sev­er­al years to come.”

Min­is­ter of Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Khadi­jah Ameen al­so gave Per­sad-Bisses­sar her vote.

In a What­sApp re­sponse to ques­tions, Ameen said, "If there is any­one who had doubts about the strength of the lead­er­ship of Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, the vic­to­ry in the April 29th Gen­er­al Elec­tions and her firm lead­er­ship as Prime Min­is­ter should have put those doubts to rest.

"I cer­tain­ly have a full con­fi­dence in her lead­er­ship and will sup­port her con­tin­u­ing as leader of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress in the in­ter­nal lead­er­ship elec­tions and as Prime Min­is­ter. Of course, we have a de­mo­c­ra­t­i­cal­ly run par­ty and any­one can choose to con­test our in­ter­nal elec­tions. But I am very con­fi­dent of her vic­to­ry when­ev­er these elec­tions are called. St Au­gus­tine firm­ly sup­ports Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar as po­lit­i­cal leader of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress."

Guardian Me­dia reached out to oth­er se­nior par­ty mem­bers but there was no re­sponse up to press time.

The lead­er­ship po­si­tion is the on­ly post that is con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly due.

Last year, Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s Star team claimed vic­to­ry over Rush­ton Paray’s Unit­ed Pa­tri­ots team in an elec­tion for ex­ec­u­tive mem­bers. The elec­tion which was marred by in­ter­nal wran­glings, saw par­ty mem­bers, in­clud­ing Paray, Ani­ta Haynes-Al­leyne, Dr Rai Rag­bir, Rod­ney Charles and Di­nesh Ram­bal­ly be­ing side­lined and la­belled as “dis­si­dents.”

Mean­while, UNC stal­warts have al­so thrown their sup­port be­hind Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

For­mer gov­ern­ment min­is­ter Dr Fuad Khan ex­pressed con­fi­dence that she would like­ly go un­op­posed in the lead­er­ship race. He said the Prime Min­is­ter’s con­tin­ued lead­er­ship was es­sen­tial to the UNC’s mo­men­tum, es­pe­cial­ly af­ter steer­ing the par­ty to vic­to­ry in the re­cent Gen­er­al Elec­tion vic­to­ry over the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment.

“She just won an elec­tion and she is the Prime Min­is­ter of the coun­try, so we will have every­body link­ing in a state, and that is what they will ad­here to. She is go­ing to win and she is go­ing to win un­op­posed be­cause if you op­pose her, you will get a lot of peo­ple com­ing af­ter you, sug­gest­ing that you try­ing to mash up the par­ty,” Khan said.

Echo­ing the sen­ti­ment, for­mer gov­ern­ment min­is­ter Dr Su­ruj Ram­bachan em­pha­sised that Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­mains the uni­fy­ing fig­ure with­in the par­ty and among its base and be­yond.

“She has proven she has the skills, de­ter­mi­na­tion, per­sis­tence and the courage to have stayed the course for nine and a half years and re­turn as prime min­is­ter. It is un­prece­dent­ed and I think very qui­et­ly, peo­ple who didn’t sup­port her or ad­mire her are be­gin­ning to sup­port and ad­mire her.”

Dr Ram­bachan as­sert­ed that Per­sad-Bisses­sar was cur­rent­ly en­joy­ing sup­port from with­in her par­ty and did not fore­see any­one chal­leng­ing her for the post of po­lit­i­cal leader.

“I don’t think any­one will be bold enough to chal­lenge her. I have no­ticed that her ap­proach to gov­er­nance in the last two months is very dif­fer­ent from that be­tween 2010-2015. In this in­car­na­tion, she has been very de­ci­sive, pro­fes­sion­al and busi­ness-like and she un­der­stands what it means, in my view, to gov­ern in the in­ter­est of the peo­ple.”

For­mer Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion chair­man Dr Allen Sam­my said all in­di­ca­tors sug­gest the mo­men­tum is with the par­ty’s in­cum­bent leader.

“It is clear that the elec­torate and par­ty mem­bers are ful­ly in sup­port of her, and no­body will op­pose her. She is un­ques­tion­ably demon­strat­ing lead­er­ship qual­i­ties that are sec­ond to none.”

Al­so con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Win­ford James fur­ther con­tend­ed that ar­gu­ments about Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s age and health should not be ma­jor fac­tors.

“What’s wrong with her go­ing back? It’s a good move that she’s mak­ing to the ex­tent that she feels re­vived. She feels strong enough to con­tin­ue in the fray. I can’t see any­thing wrong with that, and we can’t tell when peo­ple, age-wise, are no longer suit­able. There are peo­ple old­er in pol­i­tics around the world, and do­ing quite well,” James said.