RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

The seat held by Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar is set to be­come a bor­ough as soon as lo­cal gov­ern­ment re­form leg­is­la­tion is passed, Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley an­nounced on Tues­day night.

He told sup­port­ers at a Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) po­lit­i­cal meet­ing at the Siparia mar­ket that it was one of the most un­kempt con­stituen­cies he has seen, with bush­es grow­ing on road­sides and in drains.

Row­ley said it was un­ac­cept­able for the cor­po­ra­tion of­fi­cials to say they did not get mon­ey from the cen­tral gov­ern­ment to clean drains, col­lect garbage and up­keep ceme­ter­ies.

“They want to tell you that the PNM didn’t give you mon­ey to cut grass. Then they will raise racial dis­crim­i­na­tion but it is re­al­ly a lack of pride,” he said.

“We promised you bor­ough sta­tus and you will get it in short or­der. The next bor­ough will be the bor­ough of Siparia. As soon as leg­is­la­tion is passed, we will make the next bor­ough the Bor­ough of Siparia.”

Row­ley al­so took Per­sad-Bisses­sar to task for with­hold­ing sup­port for the Bail (Amend­ment) Bill which he said was aimed at pre­vent­ing crim­i­nals with AK 47 and oth­er ma­chine guns from get­ting bail.

He re­called that when Per­sad-Bisses­sar was Prime Min­is­ter she sup­port­ed leg­is­la­tion to make pos­ses­sion of hand­guns a none avail­able of­fence.

“These crim­i­nals are us­ing ma­chine pow­ered weapons. Is the UNC wait­ing for some­thing to hap­pen when peo­ple drop like flies be­fore they sup­port it?” he asked.

He al­so ac­cused the op­po­si­tion of try­ing to dis­cred­it the Elec­tions and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion (EBC) by say­ing it would al­low the PNM to steal the elec­tions.

“One of our proud­est in­sti­tu­tions is the EBC. Since 1962 we have had free and fair elec­tions con­duct­ed in a par­tic­u­lar way. We helped coun­tries as far away as Africa. For some rea­son UNC in­tends to de­stroy it and un­der­mine the in­tegri­ty of the EBC,” Row­ley said.

He added that the UNC is still us­ing the da­ta col­lect­ed by Cam­bridge An­a­lyt­i­ca in a bid to gar­ner votes.

“They don’t in­tend to give the da­ta up. They have cre­at­ed a po­lit­i­cal pro­file and are us­ing it. I am call­ing on you to dis­re­gard all the can­vass­ing of the UNC,” he said.

Al­so speak­ing at the meet­ing were Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Robert Le Hunte, Agri­cul­ture Min­is­ter Clarence Ramb­harat and Min­is­ter of Hous­ing Ed­mund Dil­lon.