Marlene McDonald 'very comfortable' with her vote - Trinidad Guardian Trinidad and Tobago Guardian Online

Wednesday, December 25, 2024

Marlene McDonald 'very comfortable' with her vote

by

Gail Alexander
759 days ago
20221127
Former PNM MP Marlene McDonald shows her finger after voting at Mucurapo Girls' RC Primary School, St James, yesterday.

Former PNM MP Marlene McDonald shows her finger after voting at Mucurapo Girls' RC Primary School, St James, yesterday.

GAIL ALEXANDER

Gail Alexan­der

Who­ev­er for­mer PNM MP Mar­lene Mc­Don­ald vot­ed for in yes­ter­day's PNM in­ter­nal elec­tions, she says she did it in the in­ter­est of T&T and her par­ty.  "And I have no re­grets what­so­ev­er..."

Ex-Port-of-Spain South MP Mc­Don­ald, sport­ing a pink mask, a cap and a shawl, was the third vot­er at the Mu­cu­rapo Girls' RC Pri­ma­ry school.

She vot­ed ten min­utes af­ter the vot­ing sta­tion opened at 8 am. Mc­Don­ald said she had left her Mara­cas Val­ley home very ear­ly and ar­rived de­spite a fall­en tree block­ing the road in her area.

Mc­Don­ald sat alone out­side the polling of­fice. To the east of the school were of­fi­cials of the Peo­ple's Cham­pi­ons team. Mem­bers of that team are al­so con­test­ing the in­ter­nal elec­tions.

Mc­Don­ald be­lieved the in­clement weath­er did im­pact yes­ter­day's vot­er turnout, "But we can see the ben­e­fits of hav­ing the three days of vot­ing. I ex­pect it will be bet­ter (to­day).

 "I've ex­er­cised my fran­chise, and I feel very com­fort­able with what I've done. I feel very elat­ed that the par­ty can en­gage in such a de­mo­c­ra­t­ic process. What­ev­er I did here to­day, I've done it in the in­ter­est of T&T and the in­ter­est of my par­ty, the PNM."

Mc­Don­ald, who was re­cent­ly elect­ed to PoS South's con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive, al­so heads Par­ty Group One in the con­stituen­cy. She stressed that she was vot­ing in the par­ty's in­ter­est "on­ly"  and had in­struct­ed her par­ty group mem­bers to do the same.

On whether some heat­ed state­ments dur­ing the cam­paign might have a last­ing ef­fect on the PNM, Mc­Don­ald said, "When you en­ter bat­tle, it has no bit­ter­ness, it's a con­test–it's no tea par­ty–and af­ter that, we re­turn to lov­ing each oth­er. We have to un­der­stand we're all in the same par­ty."

Mc­Don­ald said she wasn't sure if she would at­tend next week­end's con­ven­tion.

For­mer PoS coun­cil­lors and PoS South of­fi­cials al­so vot­ed at that sta­tion yes­ter­day.

Mc­Don­ald was greet­ed with a "hug-up" from Lead­ers in Ser­vice (LIS)  can­di­dates Stu­art Young (seek­ing chair­man­ship) and Irene Hinds (Op­er­a­tions  Of­fi­cer) who ar­rived at the venue.

]Young came to vote at Mu­cu­rapo Girls' RC. He knelt at Mc­Don­ald's side to speak to her, whis­per­ing in her ear at one point.

Hinds, who vot­ed ear­li­er at Diego Mar­tin, ar­rived sub­se­quent­ly. She took a seat next to Mc­Don­ald, re­main­ing to chat for some time.

Gen­er­al sec­re­tary un­op­posed Fos­ter Cum­mings lat­er joined Hinds and Mc­Don­ald at the venue. Cum­mings was to vote in Cou­va.

For­mer MP Cher­rie-Ann Crichlow-Cock­burn said she was vot­ing yes­ter­day af­ter­noon due to heavy rain in her East area. "It's a par­ty elec­tion, so ob­vi­ous­ly I'll be vot­ing in the par­ty's in­ter­est on­ly."

For­mer MP An­cil An­toine in­tend­ed vot­ing. San Fer­nan­do East MP Bri­an Man­ning said he was to vote in San Fer­nan­do yes­ter­day. Sev­er­al past and present con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive heads in South and East said they were not vot­ing yes­ter­day due to the bad weath­er, but like­ly would, to­day. 

PNM


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