Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress’ Glen­coe/Good­wood/La Puer­ta can­di­date in the 2023 Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tions, Mar­sha Walk­er, has re­signed as the par­ty’s Diego Mar­tin West co­or­di­na­tor, fol­low­ing her dis­agree­ment with the se­lec­tion of an­oth­er UNC of­fi­cial.

She said her stance was in sup­port of women’s rights. Walk­er has now re­port­ed­ly been re­moved as vice-chair­man of the UNC’s Pub­lic Re­la­tions Com­mit­tee, but said she is com­mit­ted to work­ing to en­sure the par­ty is the best ver­sion of it­self.

As UNC’s Glen­coe/Good­wood/La Puer­ta can­di­date, Walk­er ob­tained 799 votes but lost to the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment’s Am­ber Caines.

Walk­er al­so un­suc­cess­ful­ly con­test­ed the Diego Mar­tin West con­stituen­cy for the par­ty in the 2020 Gen­er­al Elec­tion. She lost to Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley.

So­cial me­dia was re­cent­ly flood­ed with word of Walk­er’s res­ig­na­tion. Her Au­gust 16 let­ter to UNC chair­man Dave Tan­coo and Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Pe­ter Kan­hai, al­lud­ed to an is­sue con­cern­ing a UNC Diego Mar­tin of­fi­cial.

Walk­er stat­ed that she re­ceived an email from the par­ty seek­ing her opin­ion on a pos­si­ble al­der­man for the Diego Mar­tin Bor­ough Coun­cil. She not­ed the name of a cer­tain con­stituen­cy of­fi­cial was giv­en as an op­tion.

But Walk­er’s let­ter al­leged she raised the is­sue of the per­son’s spouse hav­ing a re­strain­ing or­der against them.

“Let me re­mind this par­ty, who have the best lawyers, that a re­strain­ing or­der is not grant­ed on gos­sip and base­less ac­cu­sa­tions,” Walk­er stat­ed in the let­ter.

In it, she al­so point­ed out that she raised the is­sue be­fore dur­ing the UNC’s in­ter­nal elec­tions in 2022.

Now, Walk­er said she had “no oth­er op­tion” but to re­sign.

Her let­ter al­so spoke about her dis­ap­point­ment in the UNC’s deputy po­lit­i­cal leader, a woman, who was the first per­son she raised the mat­ter with. She al­so ex­pressed dis­ap­point­ment in “our fe­male po­lit­i­cal leader who should be the first per­son to fight for the re­spect­ful treat­ment of women,” the let­ter stat­ed.

Walk­er’s let­ter added, “This isn’t the ver­sion of the UNC I chose to serve, how­ev­er, I con­tin­ue to fight for the peo­ple of T&T and do firm­ly be­lieve the UNC is the best ve­hi­cle to do so. I trust im­me­di­ate changes will take place to demon­strate that we gen­uine­ly have women’s rights at heart.”

When con­tact­ed for com­ment on her res­ig­na­tion, she de­clined be­yond what she said was al­ready in the pub­lic do­main.

But Walk­er added, “The en­tire sit­u­a­tion is un­for­tu­nate. Find­ing a bal­ance be­tween be­ing ac­count­able to the pub­lic and air­ing our ‘dirty laun­dry’ in pub­lic is prob­a­bly the task I find hard­est in the po­lit­i­cal gayelle. No or­gan­i­sa­tion is per­fect. I’m com­mit­ted to work­ing to en­sure the UNC is the best ver­sion of it­self. The peo­ple of T&T de­serve no less.”

Ef­forts to get a re­sponse from UNC deputy leader Jear­lean John, chair­man Dave Tan­coo, PRO Dr Kirk Meighoo and po­lit­i­cal leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar were all un­suc­cess­ful. (Gail Alexan­der)