Gail Alexan­der

The PNM’s Laven­tille West con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive is not sup­port­ing the two nom­i­nees who will go be­fore the par­ty’s screen­ing com­mit­tee to­day, af­ter the ex­it of in­cum­bent Fitzger­ald Hinds.

Prospec­tive can­di­dates for 15 PNM-held con­stituen­cies will be screened this evening.

Laven­tille West will be the first area screened.

And while most of the oth­er ar­eas are rec­om­mend­ing their in­cum­bent MPs, two con­stituen­cies have nom­i­nees in­clud­ing their MPs—but their re­spec­tive ex­ec­u­tives are not mak­ing any rec­om­men­da­tions ei­ther.

Sup­port­ers from the var­i­ous con­stituen­cies are ex­pect­ed to flood Bal­isi­er House with “PNM-red” back­ing re­spec­tive nom­i­nees.

The screen­ing team led by PNM po­lit­i­cal leader Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley in­cludes deputy lead­ers Dr Nyan Gads­by–Dol­ly, Ro­han Sinanan, Colm Im­bert and To­ba­go Coun­cil leader An­cil Den­nis as well as par­ty chair­man Stu­art Young, gen­er­al sec­re­tary Fos­ter Cum­mings, op­er­a­tions of­fi­cer Irene Hinds and elec­tions of­fi­cer In­dar Paras­ram. The Prime Min­is­ter re­turned to the coun­try from Bar­ba­dos last evening.

The screen­ing will be done in six batch­es from 5 pm to 7.30 pm.

All nom­i­nees will be screened, whether rec­om­mend­ed or not, and the fi­nal de­ci­sion is up to the PNM’s screen­ing com­mit­tee to choose some­one or send the con­stituen­cy mem­bers back to seek more nom­i­nees.

Al­most two weeks ago, the Laven­tille West ex­ec­u­tive agreed to rec­om­mend Hinds among oth­er nom­i­nees in­clud­ing at­tor­ney and Port-of-Spain Cor­po­ra­tion al­der­man Ka­reem Mar­celle and Dr Kadelle Jes­samy.

But fol­low­ing fam­i­ly dis­cus­sions, Hinds with­drew his nom­i­na­tion last Wednes­day and in­formed the ex­ec­u­tive of that at a meet­ing.

The nom­i­nees for the area are now Mar­celle and Jes­samy, who will be screened. But nei­ther is be­ing rec­om­mend­ed by the ex­ec­u­tive, par­ty sources re­vealed.

Hinds, who will be pay­ing close at­ten­tion to the process from a dis­tance, yes­ter­day said that at no point did he in­di­cate he was “ap­pear­ing be­fore” the screen­ing com­mit­tee as a nom­i­nee, but reaf­firmed he was look­ing for­ward to that process and its out­comes.

Apart from Laven­tille West, the con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tives for To­co/San­gre Grande and Tu­na­puna have not made any rec­om­men­da­tions re­gard­ing nom­i­nees.

PNM sources re­vealed this yes­ter­day.

To­co/San­gre Grande’s nom­i­nees are in­cum­bent MP Roger Mon­roe and at­tor­ney Sade Mc­Sween-Bernard.

Tu­na­puna’s nom­i­nees are cur­rent MP Es­mond Forde, TTPost chair­man Dr Michael Seales and Air­port Au­thor­i­ty’s Don Isaac.

La Brea’s ex­ec­u­tive is rec­om­mend­ing Siparia al­der­man Christo­pher Enci­nas who got 17 votes when the ex­ec­u­tive met re­cent­ly. In­cum­bent MP Stephen Mc­Clashie re­ceived two. Enci­nas, Mc­Clashie and Ves­signy Brighton coun­cil­lor Jil­lon Lewis will all be screened.

Some in­cum­bents sup­port­ed, un­op­posed

Mean­while, among MPs who are fac­ing op­po­nents for can­di­da­cy, San Fer­nan­do East’s ex­ec­u­tive is rec­om­mend­ing in­cum­bent MP Bri­an Man­ning. Al­so nom­i­nat­ed is Co­coyea Tarou­ba coun­cil­lor Tere­sa Lynch.

Arou­ca/Mal­oney’s ex­ec­u­tive last Thurs­day agreed to rec­om­mend in­cum­bent MP Camille Robin­son-Reg­is, it’s con­firmed. Al­so nom­i­nat­ed is one-time MP Ali­cia Hospedales.

St Ann’s East’s ex­ec­u­tive is rec­om­mend­ing MP Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly. The oth­er nom­i­nee for the area is hu­man re­sources/tele­com pro­fes­sion­al Lyn­don Lara.

Oth­er PNM in­cum­bents who are un­op­posed and rec­om­mend­ed by ex­ec­u­tives are D’Abadie/O’Meara MP Lisa Mor­ris-Julien, Lopinot/Bon Air West’s Mar­vin Gon­za­les, Ari­ma’s Pen­ne­lope Beck­les, San Fer­nan­do West’s Faris Al-Rawi, Laven­tille East MP Adri­an Leonce, Point Fortin’s Kennedy Richards Jr, St Joseph’s Ter­rence Deyals­ingh and La Hor­quet­ta/Tal­paro MP Fos­ter Cum­mings.

Af­ter to­day’s screen­ing, the PNM will in 2025 fi­nalise the nom­i­nees for the fi­nal sev­en PNM-held con­stituen­cies: Diego Mar­tin West, Diego Mar­tin North East and Diego Mar­tin Cen­tral (held by Row­ley, Im­bert and Symon de No­bri­ga), Port-of-Spain North and South (held by Young and Kei­th Scot­land) and the two To­ba­go con­stituen­cies (held by Ayan­na Web­ster-Roy and Sham­fa Cud­joe-Lewis).

The PNM has al­ready se­lect­ed 19 can­di­dates for UNC-held con­stituen­cies. Most have been walk­ing in their ar­eas and meet­ing res­i­dents.