PEOPLE’S National Party (PNP) Chairman Robert Pickersgill yesterday denied claims that there is discord in the party on the issue of candidate selection. “What people describe as disunity, I don’t necessarily describe it as disunity. I describe it as real enthusiasm,” he said.

The PNP has had a series of hiccups in the candidate selection process since the sudden resignation of Doreen Campbell-Forbes in Portland West, and the ill health of George Lyn in Clarendon North Central.

Roger Clarke, the minister of agriculture and lands and a backer of Portia Simpson Miller in the party’s presidential race, has also been given the nod to succeed Karl Blythe in Central Westmoreland despite protests by constituents loyal to Paul Buchanan.

Buchanan became the PNP caretaker for that constituency after he defeated three contenders in September.

But Pickersgill said the party hierarchy has carried out the selection process democratically.

“But every decision brings about some amount of division,” he said. “There are those that take their defeat in a party way, in a ‘comradely’ fashion and there are those who don’t, and the party, in terms of keeping people in check, can go so far and no further,” he added.

Meanwhile he noted that the party does not have a problem finding two candidates to round out the list of 60 people seeking to represent it in the next general elections.

“The problem is selecting those that are offering themselves – and many are offering themselves despite what you hear or what you see,” Pickersgill said.

In fact, the party chairman said he is certain the party will be able to announce the names of the two candidates by the annual NEC meeting scheduled for November 26.

“I am confident that finding candidates is not a problem,” Pickersgill said.

He was speaking at the end of a tour of the construction progress at the Half-Way-Tree Transport Centre, which is being fully financed by a US$71.3-million (J$4.38- billion) concessionary loan from the government of Belgium.

The transport and works minister said he was impressed with the pace at which work on the centre was being done, adding that he would invite Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller to tour the facility in the near future.

“This work has gone on, to date, incident-free….that’s really fantastic,” Pickersgill said.

Director of the project Stefaan Van de Kelder said that this was due to very strict rules of conduct that are maintained on the site. Van de Kelder said of the 150 employees on the site 120 are Jamaicans, and the centre is expected to be fully operational by next October.

He said the completed terminal will have a 1, 500 square-foot shopping area, restaurants and automated teller machines and will be able to accommodate 640 buses per hour, provided the buses stay no longer than three minutes.