Sudama says ‘water under the bridge’

Sudama, who will make his first appearance in five years on a UNC public platform in Longdenville tonight at 7 pm, also said there must be a compromise among the Winston Dookeran and Kamla Persad-Bissessar factions of the party, if the UNC is to stand any hope of defeating the PNM in next year’s general elections.

In 2001, Sudama, former attorney-general Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj and Ralph Maraj broke ranks with the UNC over what they said was a failure by the Panday Cabinet to investigate corruption allegations against several UNC government ministers.

That event, has been described by many political pundits as the genesis of the current troubles in the UNC today. After the short-lived, Team Unity experiment, Maharaj rejoined the UNC in February and apologised to party supporters for any sin he committed back in 2001. Maraj rejoined the PNM and Sudama was readmitted to the UNC in June. Sudama told Newsday that he and Panday have mended fences over the reasons for his (Sudama’s) departure and there was compromise involved in that process. Compromise, Sudama continued, is what was now needed to bring the Persad-Bissessar and Dookeran factions back together and end the infighting in the UNC. He explained that there must be a genuinie “give and take” by both sides but at the end of the day, it was up to the UNC’s membership to decide which way the party goes.

Sudama said while these factions may have entered the UNC with “a common purpose” it was not uncommon for divergent views about achieving that purpose emerging from time to time. He also indicated that if persons elected to leadership positions within the party were not performing their functions properly, the membership had a right to voice their concerns and this was the essence of democracy.

Sudama said as a founding member of the UNC, he chose to look beyond the party’s internal turmoil and focus on the “larger picture” that a credible political alternative was needed to challenge the PNM in next year’s elections.