Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

An­ti-crime talks are now hang­ing in the bal­ance, as Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar is still await­ing an of­fi­cial re­sponse from Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley to her Oc­to­ber 14 let­ter on the dis­cus­sions.

At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Regi­nald Ar­mour had giv­en her a dead­line of to­day to sub­mit the names of her team mem­bers to him.

With no names be­ing sub­mit­ted up to last evening, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, “I’m await­ing the Prime Min­is­ter’s of­fi­cial re­ply (to my let­ter), as is the prop­er pro­to­col.”

That let­ter had sought clar­i­fi­ca­tion on sev­er­al is­sues re­gard­ing the talks, in­clud­ing whether Prime Min­is­ter Row­ley will lead the Gov­ern­ment’s del­e­ga­tion to team com­po­si­tion and top­ics. But she said she had no word since then.

In­stead, Ar­mour, who is the chair­man of the dis­cus­sions, had writ­ten the Op­po­si­tion Leader last Fri­day seek­ing the com­po­si­tion of the Op­po­si­tion’s team for the talks. Ar­mour said he was writ­ing fur­ther to Row­ley’s Oc­to­ber 12 cor­re­spon­dence to Per­sad-Bisses­sar where the Gov­ern­ment’s team was de­tailed.

Ar­mour had asked Per­sad-Bisses­sar to pro­vide the names of the Op­po­si­tion’s nom­i­nees on or be­fore to­day (No­vem­ber 9). His let­ter was copied to Row­ley.

On Mon­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar told Guardian Me­dia that Ar­mour had act­ed “out of turn”, as the Prime Min­is­ter had not of­fi­cial­ly re­spond­ed on the per­ti­nent is­sues raised in her Oc­to­ber 14 let­ter. She said then she was still await­ing a re­sponse from the Prime Min­is­ter.

Yes­ter­day, main­tain­ing that po­si­tion, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, “I have re­spect for the of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter, there­fore, I have to wait on an of­fi­cial re­sponse.”

She added, “I can­not un­der­stand why they refuse to meet and ac­cept help from all our stake­hold­ers. But at the same time, the PM goes to the US and Cana­da ask­ing for help. It does not make any sense.

“There is so much ex­pe­ri­ence and ex­per­tise avail­able to tap in­to out­side of Par­lia­ment to as­sist in the an­ti-crime fight. I re­al­ly can’t un­der­stand what the Gov­ern­ment hopes to achieve by dis­re­gard­ing in­put from our own cit­i­zens. I’m will­ing to work with any­one. I don’t like see­ing our cit­i­zens liv­ing in fear. It’s as if we’re liv­ing in an­ar­chy. All of us need to work to­geth­er.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar did not re­spond to Guardian Me­dia’s queries on what she pro­pos­es if noth­ing is heard from the Prime Min­is­ter and if the talks will still come off.

Some UNC sources re­cent­ly tipped the Op­po­si­tion’s team to in­clude par­lia­men­tar­i­ans Dr Roodal Mooni­lal and Jayan­ti Lutch­me­di­al, along with Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance leader Gary Grif­fith.

It’s un­der­stood that the AG’s Min­istry is wait­ing for to­day (Thurs­day).

Mean­while, Row­ley did not re­ply to What­sApp ques­tions sent Tues­day, re­gard­ing Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s state­ment about await­ing his of­fi­cial re­sponse. Nor did he re­ply to an­oth­er query sent yes­ter­day on what would hap­pen if Per­sad-Bisses­sar did not sub­mit her team’s names by to­day, whether talks will still be held and what may be the so­lu­tion to the cur­rent im­passe.

Talks be­tween the Gov­ern­ment and the Op­po­si­tion be­gan tak­ing shape in Sep­tem­ber af­ter Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo called for col­lab­o­ra­tion across the po­lit­i­cal aisles on an­ti-crime mea­sures and laws.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar had made an un­suc­cess­ful call for an­ti-crime talks in April when crime height­ened.