AFC to remember Sheila Holder

The Alliance For Change (AFC) will today host an event in front of its Lot 26 Railway Line Kitty, headquarters, in remembrance of the late Sheila Valerie Agnes Holder.

The late Holder of the Working People’s Alliance had, in 2005, teamed up with then PPP MP, Khemraj Ramjattan and PNCR MP, Raphael Trotman, to establish the AFC, with Trotman becoming the leader.

Ramjattan who is the AFC leader, and also Minister of Public Security in the coalition government, made the disclosure during a recent interview with Mark Benschop, on his Radio 107.1 FM live programme, pointing out that the event was postponed from November 20, the date of the death.

Ramjattan described the late Holder as a “`woman of all seasons” and one of extraordinary strength on issues of politics and social work, if one is to reflect on what she used to do. As an activist for the WPA, and a parliamentarian, she was someone who understood the values of a good community and one who used to speak out against wrong doing when she saw such.

Noting that she is badly missed by the party, he added that the presence of her had strengthened the party tremendously, her experience in all of the social work that she did, the politics she was involved in made her a pillar of strength in the Alliance for Change (AFC).

Trotman was earlier reported by this publication as likening the late Holder to a giant among women and the matriarch that stood protectively over the AFC family, adding that her death has left a void that cannot be easily filled.

“The Alliance For Change bears the unmistakable mark of her presence and contribution, which we have enshrined as part of our identity. Looking back, I recall when early in 2005 Khemraj and I encouraged Sheila to join on our political adventure. We had already made a decision that fate and circumstance had trust us in a direction that would see us leading thousands of like-minded patriots in transforming the political landscape in a way that was to be beyond our wildest imagination,” Trotman said.