Sto­ry by CAMILLE McEACH­NIE

Prime Min­is­ter and leader of the Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM), Dr. Kei­th Row­ley, says he is vis­it­ing To­ba­go in a pri­vate ca­pac­i­ty this week­end, and not to hold dis­cus­sions on who will be To­ba­go's next Chief Sec­re­tary.

This ac­cord­ing to a state­ment from the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter is­sued on Sun­day (May 3).

"Dr. Row­ley... is in To­ba­go on a pri­vate "stay at home" vis­it and has ab­solute­ly noth­ing to do with the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly's is­sue of lead­er­ship," the press re­lease said.

It con­tin­ued: "...con­trary to me­dia spec­u­la­tion (Dr. Row­ley) will not be meet­ing with or com­mu­ni­cat­ing with PNM Ex­ec­u­tive of the To­ba­go Is­land Coun­cil."

"Prime Min­is­ter Dr the Hon Kei­th Row­ley is in To­ba­go on a pri­vate “stay home” vis­it and has ab­solute­ly noth­ing to do with the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly’s is­sue of lead­er­ship; and con­trary to me­dia spec­u­la­tion will not be meet­ing with or com­mu­ni­cat­ing with the PNM Ex­ec­u­tive of the To­ba­go Is­land Coun­cil."

The post of Chief Sec­re­tary re­mains va­cant af­ter Kelvin Charles re­signed on April 29.

Charles held to his promise of leav­ing the post af­ter he was de­feat­ed as the po­lit­i­cal leader of the is­land coun­cil by Tra­cy David­son-Ce­les­tine—the for­mer Tourism Sec­re­tary and am­bas­sador to Cos­ta Ri­ca.

Since the post be­came va­cant, Marslyn Melville-Jack—the Sec­re­tary for Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment, En­ter­prise De­vel­op­ment and Labour—has shown in­ter­est in tak­ing up the po­si­tion. She told Guardian Me­dia she is "be­ing led by God."

Mean­while, in­for­ma­tion has sur­faced that As­sis­tant Sec­re­tary in the Di­vi­sion of Health, An­cil Den­nis, was se­lect­ed to fill the post.

How­ev­er, he told Guardian Me­dia on Fri­day: "There is ab­solute­ly no truth to that in­for­ma­tion."

In a press re­lease on Sat­ur­day, Tra­cy David­son-Ce­les­tine said Kelvin Charles re­mains a mem­ber of the THA and the To­ba­go Ex­ec­u­tive Coun­cil.

Cit­ing the THA Act #40 of 1996, she said the new Chief Sec­re­tary will be cho­sen at a spe­cial Ple­nary Sit­ting.

The Act al­so pro­vides for the cur­rent Deputy Chief Sec­re­tary, Joel Jack, to act as Chief Sec­re­tary.