PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Former justice minister Herbert Volney Tuesday resigned from the ruling United National Congress (UNC), less than a day after the party suffered a humiliating defeat in its stronghold of Chaguanas West in southern Trinidad.
In a letter sent to the party’s general secretary, Dave Tancoo, the former High Court judge said a statement made by Prime Minister Kamla Persad Bissessar on television following the UNC defeat showed that she “has no interest in keeping me in the fold of her government”.
Volney was fired by Prime Minister Persad Bissessar at the height of the controversy surrounding the enactment of Section 34 of the Administration of Justice (Indictable Proceedings) Act that had the effect of allowing people, whose trial has not started after a 10-year period to walk free and a verdict of not guilty entered against their names.