NDP to set date for annual convention tomorrow

The opposition New Democratic Party (NDP) will decide tomorrow, the date for its annual convention, last held in July 2010.{{more}}

“The central committee of the party will be meeting on Wednesday to finalise convention matters,” NDP President Arnhim Eustace told I Witness News on Sunday.

He said there were “no specific reasons” why the NDP is yet to hold its first convention since its third consecutive defeat at the national polls last December.

“We have been involved in a whole number of things. We’ve had a series of retreats, which have just been completed and we have been looking at the way forward,” Eustace said of the NDP.

“And those were only completed last week. We will now turn our attention to the convention, [the date of] which will be determined Wednesday night,” Eustace said.

Eustace has two years left in his current term as president of the NDP, having been re-elected overwhelmingly when he opted for early elections a few years ago.

He said that while offering up the NDP presidency for early election “is an option”, he couldn’t say “that is what I am going to do”.

The NDP head further conformed that opposition Senator Vynnette Frederick has “made a formal statement to the party” indicating that she would not be contesting the next elections.

He further said that Senator Anesia Baptiste is interested in running for the party in the West St. George constituency Frederick contested last year.

“No decisions have been made. Anybody who is interested has to go in the field. It is the constituency division who made the recommendation for the candidate and that is then recommended to the central committee, which then ratifies it,” Eustace said.