Akash Sama­roo

Se­nior Re­porter

akash.sama­roo@cnc3.co.tt

There is still no word on how long Dr Kei­th Row­ley will re­main as po­lit­i­cal leader of the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) but the par­ty’s gen­er­al sec­re­tary Fos­ter Cum­mings says the cur­rent con­fig­u­ra­tion is work­ing “quite well”.

The PNM cur­rent­ly has two lead­ers—a po­lit­i­cal leader and a prime min­is­ter.

Cum­mings ac­knowl­edged that it is an un­prece­dent­ed po­si­tion but said, “It is the first time we are ex­pe­ri­enc­ing this, and it is work­ing quite well so far.”

When he was asked when Dr Row­ley would step down as PNM leader, or if he would hold the post all the way to April 28, Cum­mings re­spond­ed, “You will have to ask him that. He is in of­fice un­til 2026, so the de­ci­sion will be up to him if he is leav­ing be­fore.”

Asked what role Dr Row­ley is play­ing in the PNM’s elec­tion cam­paign, Cum­mings again de­ferred that ques­tion to the for­mer PM.

“All of those ques­tions you’d have to ask Dr Row­ley, but he con­tin­ues to serve and per­form the role of po­lit­i­cal leader as it is, so any ques­tions about what spe­cif­ic role he is go­ing to play in the cam­paign, I sug­gest you pose that ques­tion to him,” he said.

The ques­tions were put to Dr Row­ley but he did not re­spond to text mes­sages or phone calls.

Cum­mings said there was no butting of heads be­tween Row­ley and Young and the par­ty is well po­si­tioned for April 28.

“We are good, and we are go­ing to win the elec­tion,” he said.

On March 13, dur­ing his fi­nal in­ter­view with the me­dia as PM, when asked how long he would hold on­to the post of po­lit­i­cal leader, Dr Row­ley said, “I am try­ing to en­sure there’s a smooth tran­si­tion so when I move out of this of­fice, who­ev­er moves in, the coun­try will not be dis­ad­van­taged and the coun­try will even ben­e­fit. And the same thing with the PNM, so when I move out as po­lit­i­cal leader, I don’t scat­ter the pearls. I en­sure that the PNM, as far as I am able to, is strength­ened and not weak­ened.”

Cum­mings said an an­nounce­ment about the par­ty’s man­i­festo is com­ing soon.

“That will be made pub­lic short­ly, I will re­lease some­thing on that short­ly, it will not be to­day but in the com­ing days,” he as­sured.

Cum­mings was due to par­tic­i­pate in a walk­a­bout in his La Hor­quet­ta/Tal­paro con­stituen­cy yes­ter­day but it was can­celled due to the PNM’s po­lit­i­cal ral­ly in San Fer­nan­do last evening.