Richard Lord

New Ch­agua­nas May­or, Natasha Navas, says she wants to be the Bar­bie of Ch­agua­nas. She said this in an im­promp­tu in­ter­view with re­porters fol­low­ing a cour­tesy call on Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter, Hazel Man­ning, at her Kent House, Mar­aval, of­fice yes­ter­day.

Navas was ac­com­pa­nied by Ch­agua­nas West MP, Jack Warn­er. Asked how she felt about be­ing called a Bar­bie doll by some peo­ple be­cause of her phys­i­cal beau­ty, May­or Navas said, "I have to be pop­u­lar be­cause Bar­bi­es are pop­u­lar all over the world. And that's why I have de­cid­ed to serve the peo­ple. I'll be the Bar­bie of Ch­agua­nas," she said with a chuck­le in her voice.

She lat­er de­nied be­ing just a pret­ty face. Navas said her life ex­pe­ri­ences have qual­i­fied her for the of­fice. She ad­mit­ted that some peo­ple may be con­cerned about her back­ground but she in­sists that she comes from among the peo­ple to serve the peo­ple.

She said she has al­ways been in lead­er­ship be­ing the first-born in her fam­i­ly. "You don't have to be born in­to pol­i­tics or grow up in pol­i­tics to un­der­stand it. I want to serve the peo­ple of Ch­agua­nas and that alone should qual­i­fy me for the job," Navas in­sist­ed. Navas said she had con­cerns about the im­pend­ing re­trench­ment of hun­dreds of Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment work­ers when the new sys­tem is im­ple­ment­ed next year. (SEE PAGE A11)