Ousted MP for Pointe Pierre, Gillian Lucky, and San Juan/Barataria,
Fuad Khan, were also asked to be present at the meeting while former
Attorney General Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj said he would have attended
but was out of the country at the moment.
St. Joseph MP Gerald Yetming declined the invitation, and he along
with Khan and Lucky have called it a “political theatre”.
But after a two-hour meeting last Friday, Panday said the talks
were “extremely successful” and of tremendous value.
Warner, who had been openly critical of Panday on several occasions,
told the Press conference that he apologised for all he had said
and now both would begin a process of giving the party a stronger
footing.
Panday said that emanating from the meeting would be “a vision
on the way forward”.
He said it was urgent to try to bring together all the forces.
Questioned as to the timing of the meeting between Warner and himself
as newly-appointed Leader of the Opposition Winston Dookeran was
out of the country visiting the “Friends of the UNC”
in New York, Panday said that it was held with due timeliness, as
Warner had to be out of the country on Saturday.
Warner, in what many agree is a dramatic turnaround, said he felt
that Panday should not give up the post of Opposition Leader as
yet.
“Every negative thing about Panday or anybody else that I
have said I take it back,” he said.
He said he learnt not to voice his differences in public with reference
to internal political matters.
“When I talk to people in the street I am getting worried.
If I am living here I have to make here a better place,” he
said.
Panday said even though the meeting was successful, there was still
a lot of work to be done.
He said he still thought that politics has a morality of its own,
as does journalism.
“Any intelligent person can see that but of courseeveryone
is entitled to their own view. I have been saying that for the last
15 years.”
Asked about the recent corruption charges laid against Ish Galbarsingh
and others in the United States, he said he was surprised that no
one at NIPDEC was also charged with corruption in respect of the
award of contracts in the Piarco Airport Project.
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