Ani­ka Gumbs-San­di­ford

For­mer po­lit­i­cal leader of the Con­gress of the Peo­ple (COP) Win­ston Dook­er­an has bro­ken his si­lence. He is not sur­prised by the im­broglio sur­round­ing San Fer­nan­do May­or Mar­lene Coudray's switch to the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC), but wants to be kept out of the "UNC-COP thing."

Par­ty in­sid­ers re­vealed that Dook­er­an held the key to the rea­son why Coudray opt­ed to switch po­lit­i­cal al­le­giances, but he re­fused to di­vulge ex­act­ly what led to the "fall-out" be­tween the for­mer COP mem­ber and the po­lit­i­cal par­ty. The Sun­day Guardian caught up with the St Au­gus­tine MP on Fri­day, not at his Coun­try Road, Tacarigua, home which is un­der con­struc­tion, but at the near­by Ed­die Hart Vil­las on his re­turn from the beach with his wife Shirley and friends.

Ad­mit­ting to de­lib­er­ate­ly "stay­ing away" from the con­tro­ver­sy, the for­mer COP leader is of the strong view that the foun­da­tion of any agree­ment is based on prin­ci­ples. And, ac­cord­ing to Dook­er­an, many more "dis­agree­ments" are des­tined to hap­pen in the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship, as coali­tion pol­i­tics com­pris­es such a na­ture. Like oth­er COP mem­bers, Dook­er­an ad­mit­ted he was not aware Coudray part­ed ways with the po­lit­i­cal par­ty.

Bartlett: It is all lies, COP did not rec­om­mend Coudray

This is in stark con­trast to what pres­i­dent of the San Fer­nan­do Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion Daphne Bartlett had to say on the is­sue. A plain-speak­ing Bartlett yes­ter­day told Sun­day Guardian that the COP was not be­ing truth­ful since it was the as­so­ci­a­tion who rec­om­mend­ed Coudray to the UNC for the may­or­ship and not the po­lit­i­cal par­ty.

"It is all lies," Bartlett said. Dook­er­an, how­ev­er, dis­missed the no­tion that he was keep­ing se­crets, and in an at­tempt to down­play the is­sue said: "I re­al­ly do not want to add fu­el to the fire."

'There was noth­ing in writ­ing about who fight who or any­thing like that'

Pressed fur­ther as to what his com­ments meant and if he was be­ing wrong­ful­ly blamed, Dook­er­an re­spond­ed as fol­lows dur­ing a brief in­ter­view:

Q: Fin­gers have been point­ed to you as be­ing the one to blame for Ms Coudray's switch to the UNC. Why is this so?

A: I do know about the Mar­lene Coudray is­sue. You will need to talk to her.

Did you know Ms Coudray left the COP?

I did not know about that. I am not even fol­low­ing what she is say­ing.

Did you ask Ms Coudray to go up against San Fer­nan­do East MP Patrick Man­ning?

I have noth­ing to say. Ask her.

Was Ms Coudray cho­sen by the COP as the May­or for San Fer­nan­do?

As far as I know, yes. Prakash Ra­mad­har and they were in charge at the time of those talks dur­ing lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tions.

Was Dr Anirudh Ma­habir's name sub­mit­ted for the may­or­ship?

They were all dis­cussed. I re­mem­ber... Anirudh Ma­habir, Coudray... and I think she was cho­sen.

Did the UNC chose Ms Coudray as the May­or of San Fer­nan­do?

Talk to her. I do not want to get in­volved in that UNC-COP thing. It is not that I do not want to talk. I do not want to add fu­el to what is go­ing on. The Fyz­abad De­c­la­ra­tion should be ho­n­oured though.

Did the Fyz­abad De­c­la­ra­tion state that the may­or­ship of San Fer­nan­do goes to the COP?

No, no. If you read the agree­ment it is a state­ment of prin­ci­ples. It was dur­ing the time of the gen­er­al elec­tions and then there were lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tions.

Mr Ra­mad­har stat­ed that the may­or­ship agree­ment formed part of the Fyz­abad De­c­la­ra­tion. Is this so?

There is a mix-up. The facts are the Fyz­abad De­c­la­ra­tion was done for the gen­er­al elec­tions. What hap­pened weeks lat­er (lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tions) was that there was no agree­ment; there was noth­ing in writ­ing about who fight who or any­thing like that.

What are your views on the COP stance re­gard­ing San Fer­nan­do May­or Mar­lene Coudray?

It is all part of coali­tion pol­i­tics. There would al­ways be con­flicts to be re­solved. They have to talk and sort it out; it is a nat­ur­al thing.

Is the COP stance for be­ing up­set jus­ti­fied?

It is un­der­stand­able. I do not agree that a split should be al­lowed. It is two sep­a­rate is­sues.

What role are you go­ing to play to re­solve this is­sue?

Me? On­ly if re­quest­ed I would have di­a­logue with every­body. That is if re­quest­ed. This is part of pol­i­tics. I do not see it as be­ing bad or not bad or right and wrong.

Can a mem­ber of the UNC be al­lowed to fight an elec­toral seat for the COP?

There is a pro­to­col in pol­i­tics. The pro­to­col is that you do not stay in one par­ty and fight the next par­ty. When I was go­ing up as leader of the COP I re­signed as leader of the UNC be­fore, as a mat­ter of pro­to­col. I thought it was the right thing to do and I did it.