Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

Some Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) MPs have de­fend­ed the par­ty against re­cent Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress crit­i­cisms that the PNM “ne­glects” its East-West cor­ri­dor con­stituen­cies, and PNM MP Mar­vin Gon­za­les is ask­ing UNC Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar why she is se­lect­ing peo­ple on al­leged crim­i­nal mat­ters to speak promi­nent­ly at her cor­ri­dor meet­ings.

Gon­za­les, the Lopinot Bon Air West MP, did so fol­low­ing Mon­day’s UNC St Joseph meet­ing, where UNC speak­ers slammed the PNM Gov­ern­ment and Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley.

UNC front­lin­er Jack Warn­er ac­cused the PNM of ne­glect­ing ar­eas it rep­re­sents in the cor­ri­dor and called for those con­stituents to take a stand against the PNM.

Gon­za­les and Warn­er both con­test­ed the Lopinot Bon Air West seat in the 2020 Gen­er­al Elec­tions.

Warn­er, then ILP leader, lost to Gon­za­les, and said he was go­ing in­to re­tire­ment.

Af­ter bit­ter es­trange­ment from the UNC since 2013, when he re­signed as a Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship min­is­ter, Warn­er pub­licly re­con­nect­ed with Per­sad-Bisses­sar in Feb­ru­ary. He as­sist­ed the UNC in the Au­gust Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tions.

Gon­za­les yes­ter­day said he had no in­ten­tion of re­spond­ing to Warn­er’s claims.

“He’s not to be giv­en that kind of re­spect in any coun­try that re­gards it­self as se­ri­ous about its af­fairs,” Gon­za­les said.

In­stead, Gon­za­les said he pre­ferred to ask Per­sad-Bisses­sar the ques­tion which many be­yond the cor­ri­dor were ask­ing—why was she “care­ful­ly se­lect­ing” to speak promi­nent­ly to the peo­ple of the East-West cor­ri­dor at her po­lit­i­cal meet­ings there, per­sons on crim­i­nal mat­ters who were fight­ing not to have their day in court and who be­lieve the peo­ple of the cor­ri­dor will be their lib­er­a­tors”.

“Is this a re­flec­tion of what she thinks of cit­i­zens who live in this part of T&T?” Gon­za­les added.

How­ev­er, Per­sad-Bisses­sar, in a re­ply, said, “They (PNM) can have their meet­ings and choose who they wish to speak to. It’s a de­mo­c­ra­t­ic so­ci­ety. I wish them well.”

St Joseph MP Ter­rence Deyals­ingh, in whose con­stituen­cy UNC’s Mon­day meet­ing was held, had re­buffed Warn­er’s claims.

”As sit­ting MP, I can at­test to all the var­i­ous pos­si­bil­i­ties for up­ward mo­bil­i­ty for all young per­sons through­out T&T,” he said.

“We have a range of agri­cul­tur­al pro­grammes us­ing mod­ern farm­ing tech­niques to guide those so mind­ed to be use­ful­ly en­gaged in be­com­ing in­de­pen­dent. It in­cludes pay­ing to learn with ac­cess to two acres of land af­ter com­ple­tion of the ap­pren­tice­ship. We have MIC, YTEPP and a host of train­ing pro­grammes to as­sist young peo­ple es­pe­cial­ly young men.”

Tu­na­puna MP Es­mond Forde added, “Which East-West cor­ri­dor (Warn­er) could be talk­ing about?”