Yvonne?Ba­boolal

Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley has been sus­pend­ed from Par­lia­ment for the re­main­der of this par­lia­men­tary term.

He is the first op­po­si­tion leader to be sus­pend­ed in this man­ner from Par­lia­ment.

A Gov­ern­ment mo­tion call­ing for Row­ley's cen­sure and sus­pen­sion from the House, which be­gan ear­li­er in the day, was ap­proved around9.20 pm.

The mo­tion was passed with 24 Gov­ern­ment mem­bers vot­ing for it and on­ly In­de­pen­dent Lib­er­al Par­ty leader Jack Warn­er vot­ing against, the oth­er PNM MPs hav­ing walked out the House ear­li­er. There were no ab­sten­tions.

Yes­ter­day's vote fol­lowed the re­cent pass­ing of an­oth­er no con­fi­dence mo­tion against Row­ley, which ques­tioned his lead­er­ship abil­i­ties.

In wrap­ping up the de­bate, Leader of Gov­ern­ment Busi­ness Dr Roodal Mooni­lal not­ed thatall mem­bers of the Op­po­si­tion, led by Row­ley, had walked out "kick­ing and scream­ing" dur­ing the de­bate.

He said they had walked out on the no con­fi­dence mo­tion but promised to sit through this one, fo­cus­ing not on the emails them­selves but their con­tents.

The mo­tion cen­tered on 31 emails Row­ley read out in Par­lia­ment two years ago, in May 2013.

The emails, pur­port­ing to come from Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and oth­er mem­bers of her Cab­i­net, re­vealed a plot to mur­der a jour­nal­ist, bug the Of­fice of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions and com­mit oth­er acts of mis­con­duct in pub­lic of­fice.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she had in­struct­ed Mooni­lal to bring the mo­tion against Row­ley for what she said were reck­less and un­sub­stan­ti­at­ed al­le­ga­tions de­signed to desta­bilise the Gov­ern­ment and in­cite re­volt among cit­i­zens.

The Gov­ern­ment brought the mo­tion with the back­ing of no­ti­fied re­ports from Google In­ter­na­tion­al, US com­put­er ex­pert John Berry­hill and the US Jus­tice De­part­ment, which all said the emails were fake.

Mooni­lal, in wind­ing up the de­bate, said it ap­peared Row­ley had not dis­cussed the de­bate with his col­leagues and took them by sur­prise with the walk­out.

"They start­ed to pass a piece of pa­per around and then walked out," he said.

Mooni­lal said PNM Diego Mar­tin Cen­tral MP Dr Amery Browne was prepar­ing notes for his pre­sen­ta­tion and was tak­en by sur­prise. So too was Diego Mar­tin North East MP Colm Im­bert, he said. He said just be­fore the walk­out, Row­ley got up and start­ed to yell an­gri­ly across the floor.

"I quick­ly looked around to en­sure there was no teacup or glass around," he said, re­fer­ring to the in­ci­dent in Par­lia­ment's tea room be­tween Row­ley and Fyz­abad MP Chan­dresh Shar­ma.

"Ten sec­onds more and we would have had to sus­pend the House," he said.

Mooni­lal said it was a "land­mark day."

"When his­to­ry looks back they will judge us on whether we held up the ho­n­our and dig­ni­ty of Par­lia­ment."

He quot­ed the now fa­mous state­ment of To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly Chief Sec­re­tary Orville Lon­don, which he made af­ter Row­ley read out the emails in Par­lia­ment. Lon­don had said if and when ev­i­dence come out on the emails, one man or one woman would be left stand­ing.

"To­day, one woman from Siparia has been left stand­ing," Mooni­lal said.

He vowed this was not the end of the Email­gate, re­named Row­ley­gate, fi­as­co, how­ev­er.

He promised Gov­ern­ment will chase Row­ley down with the re­ports they have stat­ing the emails were fake in Port-of-Spain, Diego Mar­tin, Rox­bor­ough and every­where they go on the 2015 gen­er­al elec­tion cam­paign trail.

"We will take the truth and hang it around his neck.

"It is not the last day. The pub­lic must judge him. If you lie, you must say good­bye."

Quot­ing Shake­speare, Mooni­lal said, "What a tan­gled web we weave when, first, we sought to de­ceive. He (Row­ley) is the mak­er of his own des­tiny."