The United Democratic Party (UDP) is once again facing internal strife as tensions rise between Hugo Patt and Acting Chairman Alberto August just days before a scheduled National Party Council (NPC) meeting.
Patt has called for the meeting, set for this Saturday, to be postponed. He argues that more time is needed to properly review and verify the list of delegates. However, Acting Chairman August has dismissed the request. In response, August told Patt that the meeting will go ahead as planned and added that Patt is free to skip it if he chooses.
Meanwhile, Moses “Shyne” Barrow continues to insist he remains the rightful UDP leader, and his legal team has warned Patt that any attempts to remove Barrow could lead to legal action.
Patt has accused August of defying his authority and called on other party members not to attend.
Albert Area Representative and Leader of the Opposition, Tracy Taegar-Panton, weighed in on the matter. “When you have more than fifty percent of your caretakers and their respective executive committee excluded from an NPC meeting that we have now petitioned for twice, then you cannot deem that as any effort to unite,” said Panton.
She emphasized that the party’s focus should be on national issues rather than internal conflict. “We have been in dialogue with all colleagues, not just Hugo Patt, to say that when we look at all the glaring issues, the corruption by government, the disregard of public officers, the disrespect to teachers, all that we see in these bloated contracts that have come to life, the issuance of land.. these kinds of stories should be what we ought to be spending our time and attention on,” she stated.
Panton also expressed support for Patt, calling him the de facto leader. “I think it has now become absolutely clear to the Honorable Hugo Patt, who is our first deputy party leader and the de facto leader of the party now that Shyne Barrow resigned and also lost his seat, that he has come to recognition that no amount of talking, no amount of reaching out, no kind of mediative process has yielded any results in the interest of the party,” she said.