BY PRIOR BEHARRY

The executive of the PNM’s Arima constituency has written to Prime Minister Patrick Manning, demanding that Member for Parliament Pennelope Beckles be given a ministerial portfolio.

Sources told the Sunday Guardian yesterday that the executive felt Beckles had been a good minister and MP in the past administration and it would not accept her as Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives.

Beckles is the former Minister of Public Utilities and the Environment.

Yesterday, one source said Beckles told her constituency executive at a meeting on Thursday that Manning told her in a telephone conversation that he wanted her to be chairman of a number of committees in Parliament.

“Nothing was explained other than that,” said the source.

The source said a member of the executive asked whether the post of chairman of a parliamentary committee was commensurate with that of a minister. The answer was that it was not.

The Guardian reported yesterday that Beckles was on the verge of refusing the post of Deputy Speaker reportedly offered to her by Manning.

No one answered the telephone at her home yesterday.

Another source close to the Arima constituency executive said:

“The executive took a decision to meet with Manning to discuss why he took the decision to remove Ms Beckles.

“For the past six years we have not seen anything done in Arima. For example, there has always been talk of the Arima Hospital being upgraded.

“There is no operating theatre for daily surgery and only talk of a 12-bed maternity unit.

“That hospital services not only people in Arima, but in Talparo, San Rafael, Blanchisseuse, Wallerfield and even Arouca, Maloney and Lopinot.

“The Mt Pleasant Road has not been fixed for the past 25 years. No vehicle could pass, so you have to go all around through Maracas to get to Blanchisseuse.

“That has been so since Ashton Forde was MP, so you see how long we talking about.

“The Larry Gomes cricket enclosure at Princes Royal Park has one of the best turf wickets in the country, but no toilet facilities. They can’t even upgrade the basketball court there.

“The transport hub in Arima? What about that? Maxi and taxi drivers have to urinate on St Joseph Street.

“Not a single road was paved in the Arima constituency for the elections, but they paved 35 in Chaguanas East.

“The sod for the Arima Municipal Complex was turned in April, but nothing done till now.”

The source said these were some of the complaints they were faced with when they went campaigning for the November 5 general election.

“That was why when we went canvassing people asking what has been done for Arima. That was why Ms Beckles get 11,000 votes in 2002 and just over 8,000 this time around.

“There are also water problems north of Arima and even in Santa Rosa, where the minister (Beckles) lives. Residents don’t have water for weeks.

“The main road from Blanchisseuse to Arima, which is 24 miles, you can’t drive your car for three days on that road without wanting shocks.

“A contractor has been doing work in that area for the past six years and (he) has only done from Maracas to Las Cuevas. When he reach La Fillette, which is in the Arima constituency, the work seemed to have stopped.

“If you living Blanchisseuse and want to go to Port-of-Spain and back, that will cost you $30.”

The source predicted:

“If they continue to neglect Arima, when local government elections come around next year, all the seven (PNM) councillors will be replaced.”

©2005-2006 Trinidad Publishing Company Limited

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