by Linda Straker
- First general council session for 2019 at Boca Secondary School on Sunday at noon
- New NNP headquarters to be completed in 2 years
Under the theme “NNP continuing to build a strong and resilience economy” the ruling New National Party (NNP) will be holding its first general council session for 2019.
It will be held at the Boca Secondary School on Sunday at noon. General Secretary Roland Bhola said the session will be used to keep members and delegates abreast of the work of the party.
He explained that originally, the session was scheduled for St Mark’s Secondary School but because the party held its health retreat there a few Saturdays ago, the executive decided that it will hold the general council in a new venture.
“And we selected the Boca Secondary School in the St George’s North East Constituency,” he said on the party’s daily Hard Talk programme. “Members and delegates will be updated on what was done since the last convention,” he added.
The secondary school is in Tobias Clement’s constituency, one of the elected Members of Parliament without ministerial portfolio and who recently announced in parliament that he may soon speak from another point of view.
Under the NNP constitution, it shall hold 2 general council sessions per year with one convention for its members.
Bhola told the programme that at present the party is on a recruitment drive because there are lots of supporters who are not card-bearing party members. “They will vote for us, the will follow us, they will wear the green t-shirt, they want the biggest green flag to wave but they don’t have a card,” he said, explaining that in the early days of the party people were proud to display the membership card of the party.
“Before Man will pull out their card and say I am a proud NNP,” he said while expressing his disappointment with the slow pace of membership recruitment.
Bhola then used the occasion to announce that the party is in the process of building a new headquarters. That project is expected to complete in 2 years.