A cham­pi­on and a half, a woman with a heart of gold and an un­ceas­ing de­vo­tion to rep­re­sent­ing her con­stituents with dis­tinc­tion, great pas­sion and courage.

Great praise was show­ered yes­ter­day on the late for­mer PNM MP and Min­is­ter Mar­lene Denise Mc­Don­ald by the PNM Gov­ern­ment as well as the Op­po­si­tion UNC in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives.

Mc­Don­ald died last Fri­day af­ter ail­ing for some time.

She was PNM’s Port-of-Spain South MP from 2007 to 2019 and had held sev­er­al Min­is­te­r­i­al port­fo­lios over her ca­reer. Mc­Don­ald had al­so been a PNM deputy leader.

MPs al­so paid trib­ute to late for­mer Fyz­abad Arthur Sander­son who died No­vem­ber 26. MPs ob­served a minute’s si­lence on the pass­ing of both.

Mc­Don­ald’s suc­ces­sor in Port-of-Spain Kei­th Scot­land said, “On Fri­day last we in Port-of-Spain South say that we lost a cham­pi­on and a half ... ”

Scot­land said her po­lit­i­cal ca­reer did not tell the true sto­ry of Mc­Don­ald.|She at all times epit­o­mised the spir­it of Port-of-Spain South. She faced ad­ver­si­ty with re­solve, grace, re­silience and dig­ni­ty.

“That’s not sur­pris­ing as her navel string is lit­er­al­ly buried in Port-of-Spain South. She was born at 3 Mosley Place, East Dry Riv­er. She at­tend­ed Nel­son Street Girls’ RC school and taught at Mu­cu­rapo Se­nior Com­pre­hen­sive,” he said.

Scot­land said that to hear Mc­Don­ald speak of the places in the con­stituen­cy was to see her come alive.

“Bev­er­ly Hills, Katan­ga, Wood­bine, Jef­fers Lane and she said it with pride.

“Mar­lene Mc­Don­ald hasn’t been in this (Par­lia­ment) for a cou­ple years but she’s nev­er left Port-of-Spain South and Port-of-Spain South has nev­er left her. Port-of-Spain South was her fam­i­ly.”

Scot­land said he wit­nessed one of her crown­ing achieve­ments when as co-or­di­na­tor of PNM’s Port-of-Spain Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tion cam­paign she brought home all 12 seats.

“Mar­lene Mc­Don­ald was nev­er one who was just pass­ing through this life; she left her mark on this earth ... we re­mem­ber her fam­i­ly, Michael and oth­er close rel­a­tives and we say to her: ‘May the Lord bless and keep you, may the Lord make his face shine up­on you, be gra­cious un­to you. May the Lord turn his face to­wards you and give you peace’.”

“Min­is­ter of the Peo­ple”—Mooni­lal

Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal said it was very dif­fi­cult to stand and pay trib­ute to Mc­Don­ald “who last Fri­day left us all in shock, when at a rel­a­tive­ly young age we lost a dear friend, col­league and to some in this House, al­most a sis­ter.”

Mooni­lal worked with Mc­Don­ald when he was Leader of Gov­ern­ment busi­ness and she was Op­po­si­tion Chief Whip, “And I can say as Scot­land said, Mar­lene Mc­Don­ald was in­deed a cham­pi­on, as an ad­vo­cate and rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the peo­ple of Port-of-Spain South and else­where, rep­re­sent­ing her con­stituents with dis­tinc­tion, great pas­sion and courage.”

“We re­call Mar­lene’s love of life, strength of char­ac­ter she dis­played dur­ing very dif­fi­cult time in her pub­lic life,” he added.

Mooni­lal said that on­ly he and Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar were in Par­lia­ment in 2007. He not­ed then-Min­is­ter Mc­Don­ald’s kind­ness and gen­eros­i­ty of spir­it al­ways at the fore­front of her pub­lic du­ties.

“She re­al­ly dis­tin­guished her­self as a Min­is­ter of the Peo­ple. No one in the then Op­po­si­tion can com­plain she treat­ed us with dis­crim­i­na­tion ... when we dis­agreed it was on pol­i­cy/pro­gramme, but nev­er per­son­al­i­ty.

“Even though we ap­peared to be hos­tile, Mar­lene epit­o­mised that tru­ism that every­thing is pol­i­tics but pol­i­tics isn’t every­thing,” Mooni­lal re­called.

House Speak­er lauds Mar­lene

House Speak­er Bridgid An­nisette-George said Mc­Don­ald was the first fe­male Op­po­si­tion Chief Whip in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

“Ms Mc­Don­ald was a recog­nised ad­vo­cate for her con­stituen­cy and the peo­ple of Port-of-Spain South. She was de­scribed by many, who in­ter­act­ed with her as a true ser­vant of the peo­ple and cham­pi­on of so­cial caus­es, in­clud­ing – but not lim­it­ed to – the ad­vance­ment of women in so­ci­ety,” she said.

Among Mc­Don­ald’s work she said, the Cen­tral Reg­istry on Do­mes­tic Vi­o­lence was of­fi­cial­ly launched, hav­ing been built up­on the sig­nif­i­cant foun­da­tion laid in large part by Mc­Don­ald.

“Us­ing her train­ing as an At­tor­ney-at-Law, she was un­afraid to use her aca­d­e­m­ic knowl­edge and sharp wit to de­liv­er im­pact­ful con­tri­bu­tions which will re­main etched in the mem­o­ry of her fel­low Par­lia­men­tar­i­ans and of all those with whom she worked. She nev­er stopped fight­ing for her con­stituents and had a re­lent­less de­ter­mi­na­tion to im­prove their lives in any way she could.

“Her dili­gence and ded­i­ca­tion has been high­light­ed by both col­leagues and ad­ver­saries as a mod­el for oth­er as­pir­ing change-mak­ers to fol­low,” An­nisette-George said.

She added she could at­test to Mc­Don­ald’s zeal and en­thu­si­asm and the fact that she was al­ways proud to re­fer to the po­ten­tial of the mar­gin­alised cit­ing her own hum­ble be­gin­nings.