Akash Sama­roo

Lead Ed­i­tor-Pol­i­tics

akash.sama­roo@cnc3.co.tt

Op­po­si­tion Leader and PNM Po­lit­i­cal Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les has dis­missed sug­ges­tions that her par­lia­men­tary bench is frac­tured ahead of to­mor­row’s re­sump­tion of Par­lia­ment, de­spite the on­go­ing in­ter­nal dis­pute in­volv­ing San Fer­nan­do East MP Bri­an Man­ning.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia fol­low­ing the cer­e­mo­ni­al open­ing of the 2026-2027 law term out­side the Hall of Jus­tice yes­ter­day, Beck­les ac­knowl­edged there were dis­agree­ments with­in the par­ty but in­sist­ed these were nor­mal, par­tic­u­lar­ly as the PNM con­ducts in­ter­nal con­stituen­cy elec­tions.

Asked whether the Op­po­si­tion would en­ter the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives di­vid­ed when Par­lia­ment re­sumes, Beck­les re­spond­ed: “Frac­tured? Ab­solute­ly not.”

“The fact that you can have dis­agree­ments from time to time is not be­ing frac­tured,” she said.

“Those of us like my­self who have been in pol­i­tics for a long time, you’re go­ing to have dis­agree­ments from time to time. Peo­ple are go­ing to have dif­fer­ent views.”

Ques­tions about uni­ty with­in the Op­po­si­tion come amid a pub­lic dis­pute be­tween Man­ning and the par­ty’s lead­er­ship over the han­dling of con­cerns in the San Fer­nan­do East con­stituen­cy.

Man­ning has pub­licly ex­pressed dis­ap­point­ment with the par­ty’s han­dling of com­plaints sur­round­ing his for­mer con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive and its now for­mer chair­man, Pa­tri­cia Alex­is.

The dis­pute has in­ten­si­fied fol­low­ing Guardian Me­dia’s ex­clu­sive re­port­ing on the find­ings of an in­ter­nal PNM Com­mit­tee of In­quiry in­to the sit­u­a­tion in San Fer­nan­do East.

The com­mit­tee raised what it de­scribed as a “po­lit­i­cal­ly sig­nif­i­cant” con­cern that Man­ning’s pop­u­lar­i­ty “may be dwin­dling,” point­ing to the sharp re­duc­tion in his mar­gin of vic­to­ry be­tween the 2020 and 2025 gen­er­al elec­tions.

Man­ning re­tained San Fer­nan­do East in 2025 by just 673 votes fol­low­ing a re­count, com­pared with his 5,173-vote mar­gin in 2020.

How­ev­er, Man­ning pushed back against the com­mit­tee’s as­sess­ment, ar­gu­ing that oth­er se­nior PNM fig­ures al­so record­ed nar­row mar­gins in the 2025 elec­tion.

He point­ed out that his 673-vote mar­gin was larg­er than the mar­gins record­ed by PNM chair­man and Arou­ca/Lopinot MP Mar­vin Gon­za­les and oth­ers, and was close to Beck­les’ own mar­gin of vic­to­ry in Ari­ma.

Man­ning al­so ques­tioned why his elec­toral per­for­mance was be­ing scru­ti­nised while those of oth­er se­nior par­ty of­fi­cials were not.

Against that back­drop, Beck­les said dif­fer­ences of opin­ion should not au­to­mat­i­cal­ly be in­ter­pret­ed as ev­i­dence of a frac­tured par­ty. She said the PNM is cur­rent­ly con­duct­ing elec­tions across its con­stituen­cies and dis­agree­ments are like­ly to emerge dur­ing that process.

“When you have that, the like­li­hood is you’re go­ing to have some dis­agree­ments. Peo­ple are go­ing to raise con­cerns,” Beck­les said.

Asked what she in­tend­ed to do to en­sure her MPs work to­geth­er, Beck­les re­ject­ed the premise that they were not al­ready do­ing so.

“You’re as­sum­ing that we’re not work­ing to­geth­er and that we’re not nice to each oth­er,” she said.

Beck­les said par­ty mem­bers must be al­lowed to open­ly raise le­git­i­mate con­cerns, but stressed that those dis­agree­ments should be han­dled re­spect­ful­ly and with­in the PNM’s es­tab­lished rules.

“Peo­ple must be en­cour­aged to be able to gen­uine­ly speak about what con­cerns that you have. The im­por­tant thing is you must be re­spect­ful,” she said.

She not­ed that the PNM is mark­ing its 70th an­niver­sary this year and has a con­sti­tu­tion gov­ern­ing how in­ter­nal mat­ters should be ad­dressed.

Beck­les said chal­lenges and com­plaints about con­stituen­cy process­es were noth­ing new for the par­ty.

“Sit­u­a­tions in con­stituen­cies where from time to time peo­ple chal­lenge or peo­ple com­plain about a process, that is not any­thing that hasn’t hap­pened be­fore,” she said.

“The most im­por­tant thing for us: be re­spect­ful, re­spect the con­sti­tu­tion, and recog­nise peo­ple’s rights to have a dif­fer­ent view.”

Beck­les al­so re­mind­ed Op­po­si­tion MPs that their re­spon­si­bil­i­ties ul­ti­mate­ly ex­tend be­yond in­ter­nal par­ty dis­putes.

“When you take your oath as a Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment, you take your oath to rep­re­sent your con­stituen­cy, to rep­re­sent your coun­try, and to do so con­sci­en­tious­ly and fair­ly.”