Jensen La Vende

Se­nior Re­porter

jensen.lavende@guardian.co.tt 

Back­bencher and Ch­agua­nas West MP Di­nesh Ram­bal­ly says he will still serve the peo­ple of T&T, should he not be se­lect­ed to rep­re­sent the con­stituen­cy.

Speak­ing at the head of­fice of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) in Ch­agua­nas be­fore fac­ing the screen­ing com­mit­tee, last night, Ram­bal­ly said his not be­ing se­lect­ed was not a de­ter­rent to him putting the peo­ple first.

“This MP work here didn’t make Di­nesh Ram­bal­ly, eh. For dif­fer­ent com­mu­ni­ties, I have been do­ing dif­fer­ent things for dif­fer­ent groups,” he said

He said he sub­mit­ted his nom­i­na­tion pa­pers be­cause he was in­ter­est­ed in serv­ing the peo­ple.

“I am in­ter­est­ed in serv­ing the peo­ple, and I will not turn my back on them. So I in­tend to do as much as I can. This is the fo­rum. If my style of putting peo­ple first is not a style that peo­ple like, then we in for some prob­lems.”

Ram­bal­ly is one of five MPs that were back­benched af­ter chal­leng­ing Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar last year for lead­er­ship of the par­ty.

The oth­ers in­clude Tabaquite MP Ani­ta Haynes, Na­pari­ma MP Rod­ney Charles, Ma­yaro MP Rush­ton Paray, and Cu­mu­to/Man­zanil­la MP Dr Rai Rag­bir.

Both the Na­pari­ma and Ch­agua­nas West seats were set to be screened last night.

Speak­ing with the me­dia about the dis­si­dents, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said Na­pari­ma MP Rush­ton Paray did not sub­mit his name for se­lec­tion. As for Ram­bal­ly, she said he would be giv­en a fair hear­ing and a de­ci­sion made that was best for both the par­ty and the coun­try.

Up to 9 pm, none of the can­di­dates had been screened, de­spite a start time of 6 pm.

Ram­bal­ly said while he was pre­pared to an­swer all ques­tions about his dis­sent, he want­ed those op­pos­ing him to know that healthy dis­sent was good.

When asked about his loy­al­ty to the par­ty giv­en his op­po­si­tion of the lead­er­ship, Ram­bal­ly said loy­al­ty was not just a word to him.

“That word loy­al­ty can’t be bandied around like is fruit to pick. They (oth­er can­di­dates who said they were loy­al to the par­ty) must de­fine what is loy­al­ty first. If they do that, then I will re­spond. But I know loy­al­ty to the peo­ple must come first.”

To date, the UNC has so far se­lect­ed can­di­dates for San Fer­nan­do West, Barataria/San Juan, Ch­agua­nas East, To­co/San­gre Grande, St Joseph, Arou­ca/Lopinot, Trinci­ty/Mal­oney, and San Fer­nan­do East.

Among some 28 can­di­dates vy­ing to be­come MPs are the UNC’s pub­lic re­la­tions of­fi­cer, Kirk Meighoo, and Sen­a­tor Jayan­ti Lutch­me­di­al-Ram­di­al.