Arrange­ments be­tween the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress and the Con­gress of the Peo­ple are be­ing fi­nalised this week, UNC po­lit­i­cal leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar said on Mon­day.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar in­di­cat­ed this when con­tact­ed by Guardian Me­dia about last Sat­ur­day’s com­ments by COP leader Prakash Ra­mad­har.

Ra­mad­har had said the COP could on­ly suc­ceed in its goal of im­prov­ing T&T if it held seats in Par­lia­ment and had reached out to the UNC to dis­cuss its de­sire to con­test sev­er­al seats in the up­com­ing gen­er­al elec­tion. He said COP in­tend­ed to “run in many seats” and had opened com­mu­ni­ca­tion lines with UNC to be­gin talks on how they could move for­ward.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the UNC has spo­ken to the COP, “and we’ll fi­nalise arrange­ments in the com­ing week,” she added. She didn’t name which seats were at is­sue.

Lat­er on Mon­day night, at the UNC’s La Hor­quet­ta/Tal­paro meet­ing Per­sad-Bisses­sar, ac­cus­ing the PNM Gov­ern­ment of per­pe­trat­ing a “blood­less coup d’etat” with Stu­art Young’s ap­point­ment as Prime Min­is­ter, is­sued a di­rect in­vi­ta­tion to Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment sup­port­ers to join the UNC’s coali­tion of in­ter­ests.

She said PNM mem­bers’ loy­al­ty and years of stand­ing by the par­ty had been tak­en for grant­ed for years with emp­ty PNM promis­es, “And their fi­nanciers pros­per. But what about you and your chil­dren? You don’t have to be ‘PNM till yuh dead’.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the PNM didn’t want her talk­ing about “red” and “blood” which she said rep­re­sent­ed their fail­ures and weren’t racist re­marks.

“Too many are suf­fer­ing un­der PNM’s reck­less rule. Now is the time for PNM sup­port­ers to wake up, rise up, and leave the PNM which has be­trayed you!

“They didn’t even give you a choice to se­lect your own leader in PNM!

Row­ley has aban­doned you. Young is now be­ing forced up­on you. Did you choose him? No! So I in­vite you in­to the home of the Unit­ed Coali­tion of In­ter­ests, the UNC. You know your lives and chil­dren were safer un­der my UNC gov­ern­ment … our doors are wide open,” she added.

“Ask your­selves, in all these years, have you ever heard Row­ley or Young or any cur­rent PNM MP tell PNM sup­port­ers that they love them? Nev­er!” She claimed that peo­ple had been hired to teach Young “how to smile.”

‘Hard luck Im­bert’

Dur­ing the UNC’s Mon­day meet­ing, UNC Sen­a­tor Damien Ly­der said for­mer fi­nance min­is­ter Colm Im­bert was reshuf­fled be­cause of his han­dling of the min­istry and was “shamed”.

Ly­der de­clared, “Im­bert, hard luck broth­er, but (Vish­nu) Dhan­paul (the new Fi­nance Min­is­ter) we go­ing to deal with you!”

UNC deputy leader Jear­lean John said new Prime Min­is­ter Young was “(for­mer prime min­is­ter Dr Kei­th) Row­ley with hair on his head.”

She said the UNC’s La Hor­quet­ta/Tal­paro can­di­date Phillip Watts has come to “dim” in­cum­bent MP Fos­ter Cum­mings’ light.