KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

In­cum­bent Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) La­dy Vice Chair Camille Robin­son-Reg­is is rub­bish­ing claims that she’s not in sup­port of Pen­ne­lope Beck­les.

Robin­son-Reg­is and for­mer PNM chair­man Stu­art Young were note­ably ab­sent from Bal­isi­er House on Mon­day when Beck­les was an­nounced as the sole can­di­date for the po­si­tion of po­lit­i­cal leader.

Nei­ther were present for the Op­po­si­tion leader’s first me­dia con­fer­ence on Tues­day.

How­ev­er, de­spite spec­u­la­tion about in­fight­ing in the par­ty, Robin­son-Reg­is made it clear that her at­tacks would be di­rect­ed at the gov­ern­ment and not her PNM peers.

“What kind of spu­ri­ous mis­in­for­ma­tion is that?” she asked.

“We are all team Pen­ny and the in­for­ma­tion I have shared with you is clear ev­i­dence of that. Nei­ther Stu­art nor I were nom­i­nees so there was no ne­ces­si­ty for us to be there on Mon­day. You may no­tice that it was on­ly the nom­i­nat­ed MPs and sen­a­tors who were there.”

Sev­er­al Op­po­si­tion MPs who were not con­test­ing the in­ter­nal elec­tion were at Bal­isi­er House on Mon­day, in­clud­ing Colm Im­bert, Bri­an Man­ning and Chris­t­ian Birch­wood.

For­mer To­co/San­gre Grande MP Roger Munroe, who lost his seat on April 28, was al­so present throw­ing his sup­port be­hind Beck­les.

Ex­plain­ing her ab­sence from the press con­fer­ence on Tues­day, Robin­son-Reg­is said on­ly those par­tic­i­pat­ing were in at­ten­dance.

“How­ev­er we were all at the swear­ing-in of the Op­po­si­tion Leader, the open­ing of the Par­lia­ment and the press con­fer­ence held there.”

Deny­ing any an­i­mos­i­ty, she added: “Please don’t in­vent is­sues where there are none. Our fo­cus and our “guns” are trained on the gov­ern­ment, not on each oth­er.”

Asked why she chose to step down from the ex­ec­u­tive, af­ter serv­ing as the la­dy vice chair since 2013, Robin­son-Reg­is said that chap­ter has come to an end.

In a mes­sage to the women’s arm of the par­ty, she said, “I have served as vice chair­man of our beloved par­ty from 2011 and la­dy vice chair­man from 2013. I wish to ex­press my heart­felt grat­i­tude for the ho­n­our of serv­ing as vice chair­man but per­haps more so as la­dy vice chair­man, as with­out doubt our women are the back­bone of our Move­ment.

“I con­sid­er it a great priv­i­lege to have served as the longest-serv­ing la­dy vice chair­man of this old­est po­lit­i­cal par­ty. To have served along­side women of pas­sion for their coun­try and their par­ty, you who com­prise our Na­tion­al Women’s League ex­ec­u­tive and mem­ber­ship at present and in the past.

“I leave with deep ap­pre­ci­a­tion for the mem­o­ries we’ve cre­at­ed and the mile­stones we’ve achieved to­geth­er. Thank you for your un­wa­ver­ing sup­port, col­lab­o­ra­tion, and friend­ship. Though I step away from this role, I re­main ever com­mit­ted to the val­ues we up­hold and the fu­ture we are shap­ing. Love, love, love to each and every one of you.”

But is this the end of Robin­son-Reg­is’ lead­er­ship role in the par­ty? Asked if she was open to be­ing a deputy po­lit­i­cal leader, she said its time to give oth­ers the op­por­tu­ni­ty.

“The choice of deputies is with­in the sole dis­cre­tion of the po­lit­i­cal leader. I have played sig­nif­i­cant roles in the par­ty for quite some time. I thank God for those op­por­tu­ni­ties.

“At this time, hav­ing served as the vice chair­man and la­dy vice chair­man from 2011, as I said be­fore, I felt it was the right mo­ment to give some­one else the op­por­tu­ni­ty to lead, and there­fore, I did not seek nom­i­na­tion. That said, I re­main com­mit­ted to work­ing col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly in the best in­ter­est of my con­stituents and the na­tion.

“I al­so served as the first woman leader of the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives, so I have op­er­at­ed in var­i­ous lead­er­ship roles. It is time to give oth­ers an op­por­tu­ni­ty and they will have my sup­port and ad­vice if re­quired.”

Robin­son-Reg­is joined the PNM at age 17 and over the decades, she served as vice chair­man and la­dy vice chair­man, chair­man of the Rules and Reg­u­la­tions Com­mit­tee, chair­man of the In­ves­ti­ga­tions Com­mit­tee and chair­man of the Dis­ci­pli­nary Com­mit­tee.

Beck­les will elect three deputy po­lit­i­cal lead­ers at the par­ty’s con­ven­tion at the end of the month.

Young could not be reached for com­ment but for­mer vice chair­man Robert Le Hunte yes­ter­day said peo­ple should not be alarmed about is­sues with­in the par­ty be­cause it’s not un­com­mon for po­lit­i­cal par­ties to have ten­sion.

“At the end of the day, ten­sions with­in any or­gan­i­sa­tion is im­por­tant to keep the or­gan­i­sa­tion alive. It’s just how we man­age these ten­sions and the leader’s job is to man­age the ten­sions.

“So, I am not in any way dis­turbed or ap­palled whether Fos­ter has po­lit­i­cal am­bi­tion, or Al-Rawi has po­lit­i­cal am­bi­tion, or Stu­art Young has po­lit­i­cal am­bi­tion. I think that is healthy. I think what is dis­rup­tive is when peo­ple al­low their po­lit­i­cal am­bi­tions to over­whelm and be dis­rup­tive in the par­ty and try to not al­low elect­ed peo­ple to con­tin­ue their jobs,” he said.

Le Hunte said his cur­rent oth­er oblig­a­tions don’t al­low him the time to de­vote to any ex­ec­u­tive po­si­tion in the par­ty.