Basdeo Panday has said Wednesday's special meeting of the national executive and parliamentary caucus of the United National Congress (UNC) is not about charges against deputy leader Jack Warner and Tabaquite MP Ramesh L. Maharaj.The UNC political leader told the Trinidad Express the meeting at the party's Rienzi headquarters is meant to determine why the two senior party members have been acting in a amanner that is contrary to party rules.
"They got a letter indicating that they were behaving in a particular manner and have been called to a meeting to state why they were behaving like this and bringing the party into disrepute," Panday told the paper.
He said the meeting would hear the concerns of Warner and Maharaj and decide on the party's next steps based on what transpires at the talks.
But Warner and Maharaj have said they have been summoned to answer three specific charges which the party has outlined in a letter to them. And on Tuesday night Warner outlined the charges and presented a defence before a crowd of about 600 supporters at a meeting in St. Helena in the Caroni East constituency.
The first charge is that both men have brought the party into disrepute by airing the party's business in public. They also face a charge of inciting violence at the party's congress last month.
Maharaj believes that if he and Warner are guilty of discussing party matters in public then so are other UNC members including the political leader, Siparia MP Kamla Persad-Bissessar and St Augustine MP Vasant Bharath, who have all publicly attacked Warner and Maharaj.
The former attorney general told the Express he was under the impression that Wednesday's meeting would have been about healing, not a disciplinary court.
"Is the purpose of the meeting for us to answer disciplinary charges, or is the purpose of the meeting for us to explore resolving differences?...I didn't know the executive constitutes prosecutor, judge, jury and executioner," Maharaj told the paper.
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