Pickersgill

PEOPLE'S NATIONAL Party (PNP) chairman Bobby Pickersgill yesterday said the Government's handling of the Jamaica leg of Cricket World Cup (CWC), has revived its hopes of winning the general election which is con-stitutionally due by December 31.

Mr. Pickersgill said the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party's (JLP) questioning of the US$9 million (J$603 million) to promote the tournament has been proven wrong. He said this has given the PNP the ascendancy.

"With the bounce we are getting now from the cricket, the Opposition has been stumped," Mr. Pickersgill told The Gleaner following yesterday's National Executive Council (NEC) meeting of the PNP at the Jamaica Conference Centre in Kingston.

Yesterday's session closed the two-day forum which was attended by senior party members and delegates. Ann Marie Warburton, an educator, and banker Ralph Thomas were officially selected as candidates for North West St. Elizabeth and North Central Clarendon, respectively.

List not complete

However, the PNP's list of 60 candidates has still not been met. Mr. Pickersgill said the NEC gave the party secretariat instructions to conduct a selection process in South East St. Ann which has been without a representative since Aloun Assamba resigned in November.

Former Member of Parliament Oliver Clue will not represent the PNP in the elections. Mr. Pickersgill said Mr. Clue has stepped down as caretaker for East Rural St. Andrew after months of quarrelling with the party.

"He's disappointed but it was a conclusion that we came to after serious thought, sounding, polling, you name it," he said.

Mr. Pickersgill said the NEC also drafted a list of events to mark Portia Simpson Miller's anniversary as party president and Prime Minister.