‘I almost died’

She was speaking on Monday night at an activist meeting in support of Ramadhar at the Diego Martin Community Centre, Diego Martin. “As many of you may know I was having a baby and I was five months pregnant and then I lost the baby,” she told them.

Dyer-Griffith, who is in her mid-thirties, said the miscarriage was “a very complicated situation” but she chose to speak about it publicly because her life is an “open book”.

“During that entire period he (Ramadhar) was the only one who called from all the contenders going up (for political leader of the COP). The only one who called to ask ‘Nicole how you going? Nicole what’s going on?’ And I almost did not make it. I almost died. Prakash was the only one who called. Nobody else,” she said.

Ramadhar is one of four people contesting the position of COP political leader in the June 29 internal election. The other candidates in the political leader race are COP Chairman Carolyn Seepersad-Bachan, Deputy Political Leader Dr Lincoln Douglas and chairman of the COP Arouca/Maloney constituency group Rufus Foster.

On Monday night, Dyer-Griffith recalled someone told her, “Prakash is a nice fellar but he’s not a politician”. She noted that “what is wrong with that equation” considering all the negative adjectives used to describe politicians.

She explained that if you are looking for someone to be a leader you will not find the perfect person in the perfect package but the way to get them to be exactly what you want to be is through providing support.

“But what you do look for is somebody who cares. Somebody who cares about you. Not somebody who calls me to say “I want your support, or I want this of I want that. But somebody who cares enough to call and find out what is going on,” she said.

“You want a nice person who will be caring enough to go the extra mile for you,” she added.

She said he was someone with morality and that that is something we do not have any more.

At times during her brief speech Dyer-Griffith had to wipe away tears. “So if you find someone who has that, run with it and go with them and support them to get them to be the type of leader you want them to be,” she said between sobs.

Dyer-Griffith, a former COP Senator and beauty queen, is married to National Security Minister Gary Griffith. The two have an 11-year-old son, Gary III.