KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

For yet an­oth­er Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) event, for­mer po­lit­i­cal leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley was a no-show.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les’ State of the Re­pub­lic ad­dress, which was held at City Hall, Port-of-Spain last night, gar­nered a few hun­dred sup­port­ers and par­ty mem­bers, in­clud­ing sit­ting Mem­bers of Par­lia­ment (MPs) such as Stu­art Young, Op­po­si­tion sen­a­tors Jan­nelle John-Bates and new­ly-elect­ed To­ba­go Coun­cil leader Sham­fa Cud­joe-Lewis.

How­ev­er, Dr Row­ley was not in at­ten­dance, al­though he was one of the longest-serv­ing mem­bers of the par­ty and led the par­ty in­to two terms in gov­ern­ment.

Asked by Guardian Me­dia about Dr Row­ley’s ab­sence, Beck­les said he was in­vit­ed to her ad­dress.

How­ev­er, when asked if he had in­di­cat­ed he would not be at­tend­ing and a rea­son for not at­tend­ed, she said, “He was in­vit­ed.”

Guardian Me­dia al­so reached out to Dr Row­ley to clar­i­fy whether he re­ceived the in­vi­ta­tion to yes­ter­day’s event, but up to press time he did not re­spond. How­ev­er, last week he post­ed pic­tures of him­self play­ing golf abroad.

In Jan­u­ary, Dr Row­ley pub­licly dis­put­ed claims that he was in­vit­ed to the PNM’s 70th an­niver­sary cel­e­bra­tions, al­though the par­ty’s ex­ec­u­tive said an in­vi­ta­tion was sent to him on Jan­u­ary 22. Beck­les said she sub­se­quent­ly reached out to Row­ley on the is­sue and promised to im­prove pro­to­cols sur­round­ing in­vi­ta­tions in the fu­ture.

Guardian Me­dia al­so at­tempt­ed to ques­tion Young, but he left im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter Beck­les end­ed her speech, re­fus­ing to speak to the me­dia.

Young al­so sat at the back of the hall, away from all oth­er sit­ting MPs and sen­a­tors dur­ing the ad­dress.