Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar is standing by her position that the meeting between Dr Keith Rowley and Ken Gordon was inappropriate. However, she said yesterday her main concern was not the meeting itself but the use of Integrity Commissioner Ken Gordon’s house and of what was discussed. “The concern is not about the meeting per se, the concern is about the venue of the meeting and the content of the meeting,” Persad-Bissessar said yesterday.
“Those are things I am seeing expressed in the newspapers. In a way, Mr Gordon may have acted as he saw fit, given an office such as the Leader of the Opposition indicated that it was something urgent, so it may well be that Mr Gordon felt that it was a matter of great substance.” Persad-Bissessar made the comment after a meeting with Chief Secretary of the Tobago House of Assembly, Orville London, in one of the committee rooms at Parliament, Port-of-Spain.
The PM steered clear of commenting on Gordon’s statement on the issue yesterday, but said she felt Rowley also acted inappropriately given his experience in politics. “I do believe that the Leader of the Opposition, with more than 20 years’ experience, as a politician, as a parliamentarian and now as the honourable Leader of the Opposition, acted inappropriately in a manner I think that goes beyond all bounds, keeping in mind the honourable office that he holds.”
Persad-Bissessar said the Parliament was not informed of the matter and this was why she described it as “a secret meeting.” She maintained that Rowley had “a lot to answer for.” She also confirmed that President Anthony Carmona had officially written to her to find out what her objections were to the meeting, but she had not yet responded. She said she would do so in due course.
Persad-Bissessar met with Carmona on Thursday, but did not disclose to the media what was discussed at the meeting. On May 15, Rowley met with Gordon at his home in Glencoe. Five days later, Rowley presented a motion of no confidence in the PM in the Lower House, in which he revealed some of the details of 31 e-mails which discussed the Section 34 fiasco.