Ramadhar on Kamla partnership 'snub': We are stronger together

Prakash Ramadhar
Prakash Ramadhar

FORMER Congress of the People (COP) political leader Prakash Ramadhar has spoken on Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar's decision that the UNC will contest elections alone, saying the best people are needed to change the government.

He was speaking on Tuesday with the media after the reopening of RBC's St Augustine branch.

"As I learned from (COP founder) Mr (Winston) Dookeran – he is my mentor in the politics – together we are stronger, and one should be very wary of risking the future of the country. If it is that we need to change government, I think we need to ensure that we have the best persons on board of all steps of life, all those who are interested in contributing to making our country better.

"I have heard the leader of the Opposition say, 'Join the UNC.' That is an option open to many. "But we will wait and see. There is time yet as to what sort of response will be had and certainly, the time for the ultimate decision will be for when elections are called. And certainly, during that period one would reassess, I imagine, the environment and take decisions accordingly."

Ask if moving from a People's Partnership with multiple parties – UNC, COP, National Joint Action Committee and the Movement for Social Justice – to going alone was a retrograde step, Ramadhar responded that different people had different approaches to things.

"What I believe in is unifying all our people across the political divide, literally. Because the challenges that we now face and continue to face require the best from every segment of the society. Whether it is retrograde we will see as we get closer to the elections and the results become (known)."

Asked if the UNC would be stronger in another political partnership, Ramadhar said, "It depends on who your partners will be, and we do appreciate that the COP had developed itself from 2006, 2007 as a tremendous force because of the personalities that were there and the work that was done."
Ramadhar said a lot of good had come out of the Partnership that had not been recognised.

He said the most important to him was procurement legislation. He also said before the next elections he wanted to see campaign and party finance reform, which Government had promised, but he had not seen anything done to introduce it.

"It matters not if you win an election and you lose a people, and the country's democracy is now jeopardised, where many in our society believe that politicians deal only with their own interests and the party's interests, and not the betterment of the country."

He continued: "I am a politician because I am an elected MP (for St Augustine), and my continued effort is to ensure that we have legislative and structural change that will protect the interests of citizens. That is the politician I want to partner with."

Dookeran was also at the launch but said he had no comment on Persad-Bissessar's statement.

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