Morris defends PM’s Independence messages

Ma­yaro MP Nicholas Mor­ris has de­fend­ed Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s con­tro­ver­sial In­de­pen­dence Day mes­sages, say­ing they demon­strate her “iron-like for­ti­tude” to stand up for peo­ple who have been left be­hind.

Mor­ris, a long­stand­ing mem­ber of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC), said Per­sad-Bisses­sar was jus­ti­fied in is­su­ing a sep­a­rate mes­sage to her par­ty’s sup­port­ers and de­scribed her In­de­pen­dence Day ad­dress­es as a “blue­print of hope” for re­build­ing the coun­try.

His de­fence comes amid crit­i­cism of Per­sad-Bisses­sar for ded­i­cat­ing a spe­cial In­de­pen­dence Day mes­sage to what she called her “UNC fam­i­ly,” with crit­ics ar­gu­ing that the oc­ca­sion should have been used to pro­mote na­tion­al uni­ty rather than par­ti­san in­ter­ests.