It is with keen interest that I looked at the developments surrounding the Central Committee meeting that was convened for Monday morning June 30th.
In that meeting the Minister of Finance was to present to Parliament the budget amendments including the Naf. 40 million for the buyout of the White Elephants, the new government building.
In the papers that same morning the UP Party stated that they want to see a timeline for the completion and moving into the building.
And as was expected, the UP faction did not show up for the meeting. While the UP MP’s were in the Parliament Building they did not sign UP for the meeting. As a result, there was no quorum and the meeting could go ahead.
But typical of the Herald’s reporting, the focus was taken away from the UP leader and the rest of the UP MP’s and blamed everybody else for the lack of a quorum.
In the editorial of Wednesday July 2nd entitled Missing in action, the Daily Herald wrote : “While the DP and UP were represented, Laville was absent eventhough he had attended a public meeting that same afternoon”
The reality is that the UP was not represented as UP MP, Gracita Arrindell was present In her capacity as Chairlady of the Central Committee. Not one other member of the UP faction, including the leader was present.
Members of the National Alliance faction were present, but awaited the UP MP’s to sign up for the meeting. Afterall, the UP is the largest faction in the coalition with 5 seats.
The coalition is further supported by MP Laville and for some time now Independent MP Lloyd Richardson also supports the coalition and votes along with the UP. If they had all signed in for the meeting, at the least 9 MP’s would have been present and there would have been a quorum so that the meeting could be held.
But, rather than call a spade a spade and write the real story, which is, that the UP-DP-Laville Coalition is falling apart, the Daily Herald tried in their suttle, yet blatant way of covering political stories, to blame everybody else for the non handling of the budget amendments while allowing the UP leader, Theo Heyliger and the other UP MP’s to walk away once again scot free.
The responsibility to govern this country, even with elections only some 8 weeks away, is the responsibility of the present government supported by the UP and DP Members of Parliament and MP Laville.
They support the government, they voted for the budget and they should publicly state whether they are in favour of the buyout of the government building or not.
As for the Monday afternoon meeting with Minister Lake not being able to continue when it was reconvened by the chairlady after the first round, it is important to note the following.
The Minister claimed he needed time to answer the questions and provide documentation requested by MP’s.
The NA, DP faction and the Independent MP’s Frans Richardson and Laville were all in favour of continuing the meeting the same night. However, after consulting with the UP faction the chairlady decided the meeting would be adjourned until August 1st.
It was then that the NA and the other factions decided not to be present when the chairlady reconvened the meeting on Monday night. And because there was no quorum the chairlady was forced to call off the meeting and reconvene the meeting within 14 days, way ahead of the proposed August 1st.
So the no show of MP’s when the chairlady reopened the meeting had nothing to do with not wanting to work, to the contrary all NA MP’s, DP’s Roy Marlin and Independent MP’s Frans Richardson and Romain Laville were in the building but not in the meeting room.
By this move the chairlady was forced to convene the continuation of the meeting on Wednesday afternoon instead of her agreement with UP faction to schedule the continuation of the meeting a whole month later, on August 1st.
