Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

“Pack up and go now, Rush­ton Paray—the Stars will beat you 40 to one.”

That’s the mes­sage from UNC deputy leader Roodal Mooni­lal at last night’s Star Team launch at the Cou­va Mul­ti­pur­pose Hall for the par­ty’s June 15 na­tion­al ex­ec­u­tive elec­tion.

The Star Team com­pris­es in­cum­bents on UNC’s Na­tex seek­ing to re­tain posts against a chal­lenge from Ma­yaro MP Rush­ton Paray’s slate.

Mooni­lal, not­ing the packed venue, added, “Look at peo­ple as­sem­bled just for the launch of our slate! I want to tell him to pack up! What can you do, what will you do - what could you do?”

Mooni­lal said when one en­tered the gayelle in a UNC elec­tion, “you have to be tough, no holds barred, we’ll beat them 40 to one by ten to one”.

Mooni­lal, who said Paray was promis­ing to build a par­ty head­quar­ters, added, “There are peo­ple who can’t give you a bot­tle of wa­ter and do noth­ing to as­sist, yet they promis­ing every­thing!”

He asked what post Paray was seek­ing, since the deputy leader’s post is sup­posed to as­sist the po­lit­i­cal leader with her job. He said many on the ri­val team of­fer­ing them­selves to run the par­ty praise the PNM in Par­lia­ment.

Deputy leader Jear­lean John said the ri­val team doesn’t seem to sub­scribe to hav­ing one leader and had poured out scorn, dis­dain and con­tempt. “Some­thing wrong with they head ... don’t let any come latelys give no chain up...don’t let them fool you, them that look­ing down on peo­ple.”

“Don’t test we! We’ll roll all over them on June 15! You ask for it, you got it!” John said, adding Paray’s team didn’t talk about so­lu­tions to na­tion­al is­sues and “these jok­ers” were nowhere around to as­sist with the PP Gov­ern­ment’s chal­lenges.

Deputy leader David Lee said the Star slate has the peo­ple who, “fought for this par­ty, grew this par­ty and built it in­to the on­ly en­ti­ty that can de­feat the PNM”.

“Don’t al­low the pow­er grab by some who want to make you go off your lane and make you be­lieve your par­ty isn’t strong. In 2020, the UNC stood alone and won 19 seats and we’re two seats from Gov­ern­ment and no crick­et club side will come and take that way from us! “

Lee said there was a man who want­ed to take UNC chair­man Dave Tan­coo’s po­si­tion but he warned, “Lar­ry Lal­la ... the PNM ripe for the pick­ing be­cause of the Op­po­si­tion’s hard work. We cre­at­ed that and in 2025, Lar­ry Lal­la not pick­ing that fruit - we are!”

Sen­a­tor Anil Roberts al­so added, “These in­ter­nal elec­tions aren’t just about po­si­tions and ti­tles in the UNC but it’s about sup­port­ing those who have giv­en you a voice in Par­lia­ment ... This (elec­tion) isn’t about get­ting re­venge be­cause you didn’t get a po­si­tion from the par­ty or Kam­la not call­ing you to dis­cuss strat­e­gy, this is about T&T and about sup­port­ing those who’ve been stand­ing up to PNM’s cat­a­stroph­ic de­struc­tion.”