JAN 03

The main opposition National Democratic congress (NDC) intends to pursue for its parliamentarians a state-financed $1500.00 given in the last parliament by Prime Minister Dr. Keith Mitchell to government ministers to look after their constituencies.

A spokesman for the congress party told GRENADA TODAY that Opposition Leader Tillman Thomas raised the issue with Dr. Mitchell at a meeting held on December 23, the first between the two following the November 27 general election.

He said that Thomas would like the seven elected Members of Parliament on the Opposition side in the House of Representatives to be given the allowances as was done in the previous house to run their respective constituencies.

Apart from Thomas (St. Patrick East), the others who won seats in the elections for NDC are: Peter David (Town of St. George), Nazim Burke (St. George North-East), Kenrick Fullerton (St. Andrew South-East), Alleyne Walker (St. Andrew North-West) Denis Lett (St. David's) and Glynis Roberts (South St. George).

According to the official, Prime Minister Mitchell informed the NDC leader that the allowance is only for government ministers who are elected ministers in parliament. He said that this announcement will rule out some government ministers from getting the $1500.00 a month allowance since they are only serving in parliament like Senators.

The list includes NNP defeated candidates - Senators Adrian "Spaceman" Mitchell (Minister of State for Sports), Brenda Hood (Minister of Tourism & Civil Aviation), and Ann Antoine (Minister of Health).

The NDC official said that the congress party will take the issue of the allowance to both the people and to parliamentarians for debate in the House of Representatives.

"We are convinced that the Prime Minister is playing games on this issue and do not want our members to get the money to look after the people in the constituencies.

"As the very name implies (constituency allowance), this is a constituency allowance and it should be there for use by all of us, not only members on the government side.

"We will not let them (NNP) get away with this. We will fight for this for our members. This is taxpayers money and it should not be used only by NNP but also the NDC because we too have parliamentarians in the house. The first sitting of the new parliament is fixed for January 9.