Gail Alexan­der

La Hor­quet­ta/Tal­paro Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment (MP) Max­ie Cuffie is among Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) in­cum­bents who are in­ter­est­ed in nom­i­na­tion to con­test elec­tions again, how­ev­er, Cuffie says he’s “putting mat­ters in God’s hands.”

Cuffie was among some in­cum­bents com­ment­ing on their re­spec­tive po­si­tion re­gard­ing nom­i­na­tion. This fol­lows last Sat­ur­day’s an­nounce­ment by par­ty chair­man Colm Im­bert of the first batch of con­stituen­cies cho­sen to sub­mit Gen­er­al Elec­tion nom­i­nees.

The batch com­pris­es 25 con­stituen­cies, 11 of which are Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC)-held ar­eas. Nom­i­na­tions must be sub­mit­ted by March 30. Nom­i­na­tions for the oth­er 16 seats will be sought af­ter that.

When asked if any PNM in­cum­bents were will­ing to serve again, Im­bert ad­vised re­porters to ask in­cum­bents.

MP Cuffie said ever since he suf­fered a stroke in 2017, he’s let God di­rect his plans and he con­tin­ues to do so.

Oth­er PNM in­cum­bents in re­cent Guardian Me­dia re­ports had con­firmed in­ter­est/in­ten­tion on ac­cept­ing nom­i­na­tions.

They in­clude Ran­dall Mitchell (San Fer­nan­do East), Faris Al Rawi (San Fer­nan­do West), An­tho­ny Gar­cia (Ari­ma), Ed­mund Dil­lon (Point Fortin), Es­mond Forde (Tu­na­puna), An­cil An­toine (D’Abadie O’Meara), Fitzger­ald Hinds (Laven­tille West).

Arou­ca Mal­oney’s Camille Robin­son-Reg­is said yes­ter­day she’s in­di­cat­ed to her con­stituen­cy chair­man she’s avail­able for nom­i­na­tion. St Joseph’s Ter­rence Deyals­ingh said he’d have spo­ken with his ex­ec­u­tive.

La Brea MP Nicole Olivierre said “Of course, I’m go­ing up, I did a lot of work with youths and oth­ers in the com­mu­ni­ty and I cer­tain­ly in­tend to con­tin­ue build­ing on the work I’ve done.”

Cer­tain PNM min­is­ters such as Robert Le Hunte and Don­na Cox are al­so open to con­test­ing if se­lect­ed.

How­ev­er, Port-of-Spain North MP Stu­art Young didn’t re­ply to text and What­sapp queries on whether he’d seek nom­i­na­tion.

Moru­ga MP Lovell Fran­cis didn’t an­swer calls whether he’d ac­cept nom­i­na­tion. He was re­cent­ly spot­light­ed in the con­tro­ver­sial Karuk­era con­cert is­sue.

His con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive meets soon and his po­si­tion on nom­i­na­tion should be known then, of­fi­cials said.

Lopinot-Bon Air MP Cher­rie Ann Crichlow Cock­burn didn’t an­swer text and calls on nom­i­na­tion.

Af­ter she was re­cent­ly shift­ed from the So­cial De­vel­op­ment Min­istry to a ju­nior min­is­te­r­i­al Plan­ning Min­istry, sources close to her said a de­ci­sion on nom­i­na­tion “would be made soon.”

It was con­firmed yes­ter­day that up to now she hasn’t in­di­cat­ed to her ex­ec­u­tive if she’d be avail­able for nom­i­na­tion.

To­co/San­gre Grande MP Glen­da Jen­nings Smith didn’t re­ply to calls. How­ev­er, con­stituen­cy of­fi­cials said she’s open to nom­i­na­tion though the process is al­so open to any­one else nom­i­nat­ed.

POS South MP Mar­lene Mc­Don­ald who’s be­fore the court, didn’t an­swer calls, nor did Diego Mar­tin Cen­tral MP Dar­ryl Smith, who was fired from Gov­ern­ment in 2018.

Mean­while, PNM gen­er­al sec­re­tary Fos­ter Cum­mings yes­ter­day brushed off Fix­in’ T&T’s Kirk Wait­he ‘s plan to con­test elec­tions with his NOW par­ty.

Wait­he an­nounced this in Guardian Me­dia in Jan­u­ary.

He’s con­sid­er­ing con­test­ing Tu­na­puna. But Cum­mings said, “He’s no threat to the PNM.”

UNC deputy leader David Lee added, “I wish Wait­he luck - the elec­tion’s a straight two par­ty race : UNC ver­sus PNM.”

The UNC con­tin­ues screen­ing nom­i­nees this week for PNM-held ar­eas in the East-West cor­ri­dor.