KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

Port-of-Spain al­der­man and at­tor­ney Ka­reem Mar­celle has been cho­sen by the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) to be its Laven­tille West can­di­date in the next gen­er­al elec­tion.

Af­ter wait­ing for hours for the re­sults to be an­nounced, cel­e­bra­tions re­sem­bling an elec­tion night erupt­ed out­side Bal­isi­er House and in the streets as hun­dreds of sup­port­ers cel­e­brat­ed Mar­celle’s se­lec­tion ahead of op­po­nent Dr Kadelle Jes­samy.

Im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter the re­sults were an­nounced, Mar­celle told sup­port­ers his top pri­or­i­ty would be bring­ing peace and love to the crime-rid­den Laven­tille com­mu­ni­ty.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia out­side Bal­isi­er House, Mar­celle said, “It is a tes­ta­ment of per­sons all over Port-of-Spain gath­ered here tonight, who, when they come back home, may not be able to cross a bor­der or cross a street, but here they are tonight. My num­ber one pri­or­i­ty will be bring­ing back peace and love in east Port-of-Spain. If it’s one thing that will be on the top of my pri­or­i­ty list is that.”

He added, “I am so deeply grate­ful. It has not been an easy road but we fought a good and clean fight. This sto­ry is not just about Ka­reem Mar­celle. It’s about every young per­son from east Port-of-Spain who dare to dream and dare to try to achieve their truest po­ten­tial no mat­ter which com­mu­ni­ty they come from. My fa­ther is serv­ing a life sen­tence in the Unit­ed States for mur­der and here I am to­day de­spite that be­ing an at­tor­ney-at-law, an al­der­man and al­so to be the next Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment for Laven­tille West ... I want to en­cour­age all young per­sons to step for­ward and take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for your com­mu­ni­ty, for your home and for this coun­try.”

He thanked the screen­ing com­mit­tee and the Laven­tille West con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive led by al­der­man Richard Wal­cott for putting their faith and con­fi­dence in him, say­ing he would not let them down.

“I will be a rep­re­sen­ta­tive for all of Laven­tille West, no one com­mu­ni­ty will be favoured. Every­one will have my fullest sup­port.

Mar­celle, who was screened along with Jes­samy around 8 pm, was the lone male prospect af­ter in­cum­bent MP Fitzger­ald Hinds with­drew his con­sent to be screened days ago. Mar­celle had the re­sound­ing sup­port of the Laven­tille West women’s league, who want­ed Hinds out.

How­ev­er, be­fore he bowed out of rep­re­sen­ta­tive pol­i­tics last week, the con­stituen­cy’s ex­ec­u­tive threw their sup­port be­hind Hinds in­stead of Mar­celle.

Nev­er­the­less, Mar­celle said he is look­ing for­ward to get­ting help from Hinds head­ing in­to the gen­er­al elec­tion.

“I would not know but I want to on this oc­ca­sion salute my Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment, the ho­n­ourable Fitzger­ald Hinds. To have served 30 years in pub­lic of­fice is not an easy task. I re­spect Mr Hinds and I have love for him and I want to wish him all the best in his fu­ture en­deav­ours be­cause we know as a par­ty and as a coun­try, it is no easy task be­ing in pub­lic ser­vice for so long,” Mar­celle said.

“I in­tend to reach out to him in short or­der and al­so to get his guid­ance in some ar­eas and where he may be able to help me be­cause I am a young per­son in pol­i­tics and we are go­ing to de­pend and lean on all the dif­fer­ent lead­ers with­in our par­ty and MP Hinds I thank you, we love you and we ap­pre­ci­ate you in the PNM. We ap­pre­ci­ate you in Laven­tille West.”

Mean­while, de­feat­ed prospect Dr Jes­samy said, “It was an ho­n­our to be screened and I want to con­grat­u­late Mr Mar­celle on a job well done.”

Al­so screened and cho­sen once again to rep­re­sent PNM at the polls were Point Fortin MP Kennedy Richards Jr, San Fer­nan­do West MP Faris Al-Rawi, Ari­ma MP Pen­ne­lope Beck­les, D’Abadie-O’Meara MP Lisa Mor­ris-Ju­lian, La Hor­quet­ta-Tal­paro MP Fos­ter Cum­mings, Lopinot-Bon Air West MP Mar­vin Gon­za­les and St Joseph MP Ter­rence Deyals­ingh, who were all un­op­posed.

San Fer­nan­do East MP Bri­an Man­ning mean­while got the screen­ing com­mit­tee’s nod over Tere­sa Lynch.

To­co-San­gre Grande MP Roger Mon­roe was cho­sen over at­tor­ney Sade Mc­Queen-Bernard and Arou­ca-Mal­oney MP Camille Robin­son-Reg­is was se­lect­ed ahead of for­mer Arou­ca MP Ali­cia Hospedales.

In St Ann’s East, MP Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly beat Lyn­don Lara, broth­er of crick­eter Bri­an Lara, and Gezelle Cuffy.

In­cum­bent Tu­na­puna MP Es­mond Forde was al­so cho­sen ahead of Sen­a­tor Michael Seales and Don Isaac.

Al­so screened by the PNM yes­ter­day was in­cum­bent MP Stephen Mc­Clashie, Christo­pher Enci­nas and Jil­lon Lewis for the La Brea con­stituen­cy. How­ev­er, they were all re­ject­ed by the screen­ing com­mit­tee and par­ty groups were told to choose fresh prospects.

Cho­sen can­di­dates

Ari­ma: Pen­ne­lope Beck­les

Arou­ca-Mal­oney: Camille Robin­son-Reg­is

D’Abadie-O’Meara: Lisa Mor­ris-Ju­lian

La Hor­quet­ta-Tal­paro: Fos­ter Cum­mings

Laven­tille West: Ka­reem Mar­celle

Lopinot-Bon Air West: Mar­vin Gon­za­les

Point Fortin: Kennedy Richards Jr

San Fer­nan­do East: Bri­an Man­ning

San Fer­nan­do West: Faris Al-Rawi

St Ann’s East: Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly

St Joseph: Ter­rence Deyals­ingh

To­co-San­gre Grande: Roger Mon­roe

Tu­na­puna: Es­mond Forde

Ed­i­tor's note: In an ear­li­er ver­sion of this sto­ry, we re­port­ed that in­cum­bent Laven­tille East-Mor­vant MP Adri­an Leonce, who was an un­op­posed can­di­date, had al­so been se­lect­ed to re­turn based on in­for­ma­tion re­ceived from a PNM of­fi­cial. How­ev­er, Leonce has since con­firmed that he was forced to with­draw from his can­di­da­cy just be­fore the screen­ing ses­sion due to a fam­i­ly is­sue.