KEVON FELMINE

While nom­i­na­tion day is usu­al­ly a mun­dane process hyped with flags and tas­sa, the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) dropped a sur­prise with for­mer Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) al­der­man Hy­acinth Ram­per­sads­ingh among the PNM cam­paign team sup­port­ing can­di­date An­der­son “Andy” “Pa­pi” Nanan for the Quinam/Morne Di­a­blo by-elec­tions.

Ram­per­sads­ingh, al­so a for­mer Quinam/Morne Di­a­blo coun­cil­lor at the Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion, had tout­ed her­self as Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s 'sis­ter'. A staunch fol­low­er of Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s work in her Siparia con­stituen­cy, Ram­per­sads­ingh told re­porters that noth­ing is cast in stone when asked about shift­ing her loy­al­ty.

“The on­ly thing I have to do is to die,” Ram­per­sads­ingh said out­side the Re­turn­ing Of­fi­cer’s of­fice along the SS Erin Road, Pe­nal.

“I was free. I was not ob­lig­at­ed to any­body, and when An­der­son called me and said he would like to get some­body like me to be in his cam­paign, I said well, fine, I am free, and I will go with you. I will ad­vise you. I will walk with you, and I will do what­ev­er is nec­es­sary to make your cam­paign suc­cess­ful,” she said.

De­spite wear­ing red, Ram­per­sads­ingh de­nied jump­ing be­tween par­ties or any rum­blings be­tween her and the UNC, say­ing every­one has a choice. She said the mood was hype in Nanan’s camp, and he was in good spir­its be­cause he felt the love and sup­port of the peo­ple in the dis­trict. She de­scribed Nanan as a pas­sion­ate and ground­ed man who loves peo­ple, sees their needs and wants to bring rep­re­sen­ta­tion to the peo­ple.

Asked why some UNC mem­bers are cross­ing over to the PNM, Ram­per­sads­ingh said peo­ple are just shift­ing al­le­giance, which is their choice to make. She said every­thing in life is for a time, and UNC will not be there for­ev­er.

Asked if she could re­turn to the UNC, Ram­per­sads­ingh asked, “Why am I jump­ing? I have oth­er things to do. I have lead­er­ship qual­i­ties and have en­gaged in com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice for the past 45 years with­out stray­ing, re­gard­less of UNC and PNM. I work with every­body across the board. I am a woman like that. You know: Easy to find, easy to get along with, al­ways reach­able, al­ways for the peo­ple and with the peo­ple.”