GAIL ALEXAN­DER

Pun­dit Satyanana Ma­haraj, spir­i­tu­al leader of the Aranguez Satya Anand Ashram, has called on Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar to con­sid­er reach­ing out to the voic­es with­in the par­ty who are call­ing for her res­ig­na­tion to try and reach a con­sen­sus to re­build the par­ty.

Ma­haraj stat­ed this in a let­ter to Per­sad-Bisses­sar yes­ter­day, which he said was ac­knowl­edged by Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

Ma­haraj’s let­ter fol­lows a se­ries of con­cerns on her lead­er­ship raised since last Mon­day’s Gen­er­al Elec­tion which the UNC lost to the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment.

UNC stal­warts Fuad Khan, De­vant Ma­haraj and Vas­ant Bharath have said Per­sad-Bisses­sar should step down. Sev­er­al MPs who were re­placed ahead of the elec­tion—in­clud­ing Fazal Karim, Ra­mona Ram­di­al, Chris­tine Newal­lo-Ho­sein—have al­so said in­tro­spec­tion is need­ed in the par­ty. But sev­er­al of the new MPs elect­ed in Mon­day elec­tion have is­sued state­ments sup­port­ing Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

How­ev­er, ex­pert an­a­lyst Dr Win­ford James and for­mer pub­lic ser­vice head Regi­nald Du­mas have al­so said she should re­sign ac­cord­ing to the West­min­ster sys­tem T&T fol­lows and an­a­lyst Dr Bish­nu Ra­goonath said there are de­ci­sions to make.

Yes­ter­day in his let­ter, which he sent to the me­dia, Ma­haraj said, “Dear leader, the re­sults of the 2020 Gen­er­al Elec­tions, though not yet of­fi­cial­ly de­clared, is clear­ly point­ing to the fact that the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment has won the elec­tions. The wide­spread dif­fer­ence of votes be­tween the UNC and PNM in the five seats which is be­ing re­count­ed will not change the re­sults giv­en in the pub­lic do­main. For bet­ter or worse, the run­ning of this coun­try now be­longs to Dr Row­ley and the PNM.”

He added, “The re­sult has dis­ap­point­ed and hurt many thou­sands of UNC mem­bers and sup­port­ers who were ex­pect­ing a UNC gov­ern­ment. This was an elec­tion that many thought that the UNC could not lose.”

He thanked Per­sad-Bisses­sar for lead­ing the par­ty over the last ten-plus years but said she could not look past the dis­en­chant­ment.

“I re­spect­ful­ly rec­om­mend for your con­sid­er­a­tion that you reach out to the dis­cor­dant voic­es with­in the UNC and meet with all par­ties and at­tempt to reach a con­sen­sus to re­build the par­ty and heal all who have been hurt in the process,” Ma­haraj said.

“The eas­i­est thing will be to dis­miss and ig­nore those call­ing on you to step down. I urge that you rise above this and in­stead take the high ground and call for all to come and speak with you di­rect­ly. You have al­ways been open to di­a­logue, I humbly re­mind you that your great­est lega­cy lies ahead of you not be­hind.”

Re­cent­ly al­so, at­tor­ney Kelvin Ramkissoon—a mem­ber of UNC’s le­gal team—stat­ed in a post that he didn’t want to watch a news con­fer­ence the UNC had that day and in a prop­er democ­ra­cy when a leader los­es elec­tion, the prop­er thing is done.

“They don’t hold on—that is the essence of the West­min­is­ter sys­tem,” Ramkissoon said.

Ramkissoon said the leader knows that and the ques­tion was not who would take over, since that should be left to those who con­sti­tute the en­ti­ty. He ad­vo­cat­ed “mov­ing on with dig­ni­ty while you still have it.”