Resh­ma Ra­goonath

In the face of mount­ing at­tacks on her char­ac­ter Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar says she will not be pro­voked in­to do­ing any­thing to de­stroy the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship. Per­sad-Bisses­sar, ad­dress­ing the Unit­ed Na­tion­al?Con­gress' Mon­day night fo­rum at Tul­sa Trace Hin­du School, said: "I will not be pro­voked in­to rash ac­tion."

Over the past week Per­sad-Bisses­sar's lead­er­ship of the PP Gov­ern­ment has been scru­ti­nised as Con­gress of the Peo­ple mem­bers Win­ston?Dook­er­an and Car­olyn Seep­er­sad-Bachan were crit­i­cal of com­ments made by UNC MPs Dr Roodal?Mooni­lal and Jack?Warn­er on?Dr Wayne Kublals­ingh's hunger strike.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar al­so came un­der pres­sure from civ­il so­ci­ety groups which dis­ap­proved of Gov­ern­ment's han­dling of the strike. How­ev­er, the Prime Min­is­ter was firm in her re­solve as she told the par­ty faith­ful: "What you are see­ing is a leader with tremen­dous pa­tience and for­ti­tude. I will not be pro­voked to do any­thing that will de­stroy what you have worked for, which is a Part­ner­ship Gov­ern­ment."

The Prime Min­is­ter al­so made it clear she was no pushover or a "pup­pet in the hands of any­one. "I have al­ways said, and I re­peat, I am not for rent or sale to any­one. Had I been, I would not have been here to­day," she added. This elicit­ed loud shouts and cheers from the sup­port­ers who braved bad weath­er to show their sol­i­dar­i­ty with her.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar al­so re­spond­ed to Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th?Row­ley's al­le­ga­tion that "in­vis­i­ble hands" were in con­trol of the Gov­ern­ment. She said: "He may be right. Whilst we sit in the Cab­i­net and sit in the Par­lia­ment of your Gov­ern­ment we are al­ways guid­ed by putting God in front and walk­ing be­hind."

She al­so re­it­er­at­ed her state­ments from the UNC's Con­gress at Rien­zi Com­plex that "I will al­so not al­low per­sons with pri­vate agen­das for their own ag­gran­dis­e­ment to mash up the Part­ner­ship. She added: "We have agreed to work with cer­tain prin­ci­ples and guide­lines. Now we must show by our ac­tions and words we are se­ri­ous about gov­ern­ing this coun­try as a part­ner­ship.

"I have said be­fore and I say again, don't mis­take my be­ing a woman as be­ing weak." Per­sad-Bisses­sar said all at­tacks on her Gov­ern­ment had failed and "now they have be­gun di­rect at­tacks on your leader and Prime Min­is­ter. They are go­ing to con­tin­ue to at­tack the char­ac­ter of your PM." "What they did not cater for was that we are one," she added.