Opposition Leader Dr Keith Rowley has suggested that the newly formed Third Force Movement is a political offshoot of the coalition People’s Partnership. Speaking at the People’s National Movement’s (PNM) “Conversations with Dr Keith Rowley” in St Joseph on Monday night, Rowley told the intimate gathering that the new entity was “in the bosom” of the United National Congress (UNC).
Rowley believes that it was formed to get votes from people who were unhappy with the UNC and the Congress of the People (COP), and may be leaning towards voting for the PNM instead. The Third Force Movement is a political unit comprising former Congress of the People member and former president of the senate, Timothy Hamel-Smith, and former Clico head Gerald Yetming. The party is also made up of former COP chairman and political leader of the Alliance of Independents (AOI) Nicole Dyer-Griffith, independent candidate for Diego Martin West Phillip Alexander and National Alliance for Reconstruction (NAR), headed by Dr Carson Charles. Hamel-Smith is the party’s spokesman.
“But he only recently was in the bosom of the UNC seeking for his place in the UNC and still is but they know that there are people out there who voted for the COP in the last election, they know that those persons cannot properly be encouraged to vote for the UNC again and they know that those persons are likely to vote for the PNM so Mr Hamel-Smith and his group and the UNC conspired to form a political party with no hope whatsoever of winning a seat or polling division nowhere in the country,” Rowley said.
“But in particular constituencies, those persons who they believe will not in 2015 vote for the PNM, they are hoping to syphon them off from the PNM. In other words it is another UNC wolf in sheep clothing,” he said.
“Ask Mr Hamel-Smith is it that he has abandoned the COP and the COP principles? If the answer is yes, then he is agreeing with the PNM that the COP is not worthy of your vote,” he said.
Two weeks ago, both Hamel-Smith and Yetming appeared on the UNC platform during a political meeting in Debe.
“And secondly, how much of a UNC is that party? Let me tell you what that party is, that is a party led by Mr Hamel-Smith, who was as much a Partnership man as a Partnership man could be,” Rowley said.
Rowley also blasted the COP as being the “biggest political disappointment in the Commonwealth” because it “encouraged the UNC in its corrupt practice. A leadership that sold its membership down the river to preserve a seat,” he said.
Though the event was billed as a conversation with the PNM political leader, he delivered a speech first and then took several questions from the audience. The questions addressed some of the easier topics that the PNM had faced before including the resurrection of the rapid rail plan, plans to tackle pollution and crime.
Rowley confirmed that a mass transit plan was still on the PNM cards as it will improve the quality of life for citizens. He said the Government proposal of more buses was a poor one as even the Priority Bus Route is clogged with traffic. He promised to not just return the plan to the table but have an independent review of the billion dollar project. The project has already cost the former government some $55 million for the planning, identification of feasible alternatives and preliminary engineering portion of the plan.
He said the country was currently paying $4.5 billion in fuel subsidy, which is often burned off when drivers sit in traffic for hours.
“I don’t know the exact figure but I know its a huge amount,” he said.
“Which year will this problem be solved?” he asked.
Rowley said previous governments established much more with spending considerably less money and questioned what legacy this and the next government will leave for the country.