Gail Alexan­der

Even be­fore Jailall Kissoon's race com­ments were re­port­ed from Jack Warn­er's plat­form, sev­er­al Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship MPs made it clear they do not in­tend to cross the floor if Warn­er wins the Ch­agua­nas West seat on Mon­day.TOP MP Ver­nel­la Al­leyne-Top­pin, how­ev­er, al­so made it clear that while she was to­tal­ly com­mit­ted to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, the en­tire by-elec­tion sce­nario and cli­mate was very "painful" for her.

The T&T Guardian spoke with MPs ear­li­er in the week as claims con­tin­ued on the ground, and via Warn­er's plat­form, that sev­er­al PP MPs were wait­ing to cross the floor and join him once he won Mon­day's by-elec­tion.UNC MPs will be present at to­mor­row's UNC ral­ly at Pierre Road, Ch­agua­nas, start­ing from 3 pm.

UNC's Rien­zi Com­plex sec­re­tari­at said the ral­ly would in­volve a na­tion­al crowd of sup­port­ers from all over T&T. It said UNC cam­paign meet­ings in Ch­agua­nas West had so far on­ly fea­tured a lo­cal "home crowd from the con­stituen­cy and near­by con­stituen­cies."The UNC ral­ly will have com­pe­ti­tion for at­ten­tion to­mor­row how­ev­er, since the Op­po­si­tion PNM is hold­ing its cli­max mo­tor­cade through­out Ch­agua­nas West from 2 pm. Bal­isi­er House yes­ter­day con­firmed the event.

Part­ner­ship lead­ers are ex­pect­ed to be part of the UNC's ral­ly plat­form to­mor­row.How­ev­er, while the COP plans rep­re­sen­ta­tion, TOP leader Ash­worth Jack said yes­ter­day he was un­cer­tain if he would at­tend since he may be out of T&T.Asked his view on the is­sues emerg­ing from the by-elec­tion, Jack, who at­tend­ed pre­vi­ous UNC fo­rum cam­paign meet­ings, said he must be con­cerned at the by-elec­tion cli­mate.He said he did not think it re­quired leav­ing the Part­ner­ship, as a cer­tain COP fac­tion was now pur­su­ing.

Jack said: "It re­quires peo­ple sit­ting down and speak­ing with each oth­er on is­sues. Pol­i­tics isn't for the faint-heart­ed, you know. These sit­u­a­tions don't mean we can't work things out."Kei­th Row­ley and Patrick Man­ning had their own sim­i­lar fight, so for me it's a ques­tion of peo­ple putting T&T first. The coun­try now seems to be on an ego trip."

Jack's TOP col­league, Al­leyne-Top­pin, ques­tioned whether Warn­er could in fact re­turn to the PP if he won, not­ing that the Part­ner­ship, un­der which MPs are bound by col­lec­tive re­spon­si­bil­i­ty, will de­cide.On the PM's ini­tial stance that Warn­er could not re­turn to the PP if he wins (though the PM sub­se­quent­ly called on Warn­er to clear his name and re­turn ), Al­leyne-Top­pin said she had al­ready not­ed the Part­ner­ship would de­cide, and: "What­ev­er it de­cides, I will abide by it."

Say­ing the en­tire cur­rent sit­u­a­tion is painful for her, she said TOP mem­bers were dai­ly dis­cussing the is­sues aris­ing from the by-elec­tion sce­nario.She said she was con­cerned about all the in­for­ma­tion com­ing out, since it could af­fect T&T's in­ter­na­tion­al im­age, as well as lo­cal­ly.She had no com­ment on Warn­er's al­le­ga­tions about the Gov­ern­ment, save to say TOP mem­bers were dis­cussing all is­sues "com­ing out."

Al­leyne-Top­pin's col­league, MP Del­mon Bak­er, did not an­swer calls yes­ter­day.UNC MP Fuad Khan, who had been sup­port­ive of Warn­er af­ter the lat­ter re­signed, said yes­ter­day: "I'm a UNC MP and at this time. Whether or not Jack wins, I stay UNC."Ad­vis­er to the Cab­i­net, UNC MP Ru­pert Grif­fith, when asked if he would join Warn­er if the lat­ter wins Mon­day, said:

"Ab­solute­ly not. I'm a life mem­ber of the UNC and when I re­tire from pol­i­tics then I will be in re­tire­ment. Mon­day will fix a lot of things cur­rent­ly tak­ing place."Jack Warn­er's new move­ment will lose dev­as­tat­ing­ly on Mon­day, pos­si­bly even to the point he may lose his de­posit."UNC's Clifton De Coteau said he had no plans to cross the floor at any time if Warn­er won.

"Why are peo­ple tak­ing on that pro­pa­gan­da?" he asked.UNC Pointe-a-Pierre MP Er­rol Mcleod has re­mained silent on the is­sue but has been at­tend­ing UNC cam­paign meet­ings.Warn­er's ILP holds a pub­lic meet­ing at Fe­lic­i­ty, Ch­agua­nas, to­day. Warn­er will at­tend church to­mor­row and the par­ty holds a mo­tor­cade on Sun­day from Saith Park, Ch­agua­nas.

Si­lence from Gyp­sy, Anil

UNC MP Win­ston "Gyp­sy" Pe­ters, who was at Warn­er's side when he held his first pub­lic meet­ing af­ter leav­ing the Gov­ern­ment and con­sis­tent­ly ap­peared sup­port­ive of his col­league, told T&T Guardian he did not want to com­ment on whether he would cross the floor if Warn­er won.Pe­ters said even when he had said "no com­ment" on this be­fore, his "ad­den­da" were used.

COP MP Anil Roberts, who has been low-key af­ter UNC fo­rums in ear­li­er months af­ter Warn­er re­signed, did not an­swer ques­tions on whether he would cross the floor if Warn­er won. Roberts' COP col­league Rodger Samuel, who re­cent­ly hint­ed at leav­ing his job at the Of­fice of the PM over un­spec­i­fied con­cerns he has, is on a sev­en-day fast/prayer pe­ri­od which ends on Mon­day. He said he would in­di­cate his di­rec­tion af­ter that.

The PM's na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty ad­vis­er Gary Grif­fith, who re­signed from the UNC in June, said he would de­cide if he was re­turn­ing to the COP, where his wife Nicole is vice chair­man, af­ter Mon­day. Soon af­ter Warn­er formed the ILP, Grif­fith told T&T Guardian he had no in­ten­tion of join­ing Warn­er.