By Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Apr 27, CMC -More than one million voters in Trinidad and Tobago go to the polls on Monday to elect a new government, with the opinion polls -official and unofficial- suggesting that the outcome is too close to call.
While 161 candidates and 17 political parties contest the 41 seats in the Parliament, the race, as it has been over the past decades, will be a straight fight between the incumbent People’s National Movement (PNM) and the main opposition United National Congress (UNC).
Prime Minister Stuart Young
There are an estimated 1,154,708 persons who are eligible to cast ballots at the 2.130 polling stations on Monday, and the Elections and Boundaries Commission (EBC), chief executive officer, Fern Narcis-Scope, said it is prepared for the event, given that the country would have anticipated the elections being held this year. The polls will be observed by teams from the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and the Commonwealth.
The EBC has said that “in a significant demonstration of its commitment to transparency, integrity, and stakeholder engagement,” it hosted a meeting with members of the Diplomatic Corps last Friday and that the “discussions were constructive and informative, reflecting a shared commitment to supporting free, fair, and credible electoral processes.
“The Heads of Mission were also briefed on special voting arrangements, procedures for the secure counting of ballots, and protocols to ensure the timely and accurate announcement of results,” it added.
It will be the first election after the EBC redrew the lines for 16 constituencies and renamed five. The Commission has had to deal with several issues during the run-up to Monday’s polls, including being “made aware of a falsified document currently in circulation that inaccurately claims affiliations between the Commission’s Chief Election Officer (CEO) and several Returning Officers with a political party.
“These unfounded assertions seriously misrepresent the truth and pose a direct threat to the integrity of the electoral process and the forthcoming Parliamentary Elections,” the EBC said, as it “categorically rejects and unequivocally condemns these baseless claims”.
The police have also warned that they are actively investigating reports of voter intimidation and voter suppression and that their disclosure of a threat to disrupt the polls appears to have spoiled those plans.
Acting Commissioner of Police, Junior Benjamin, in a statement on Saturday, said the police have received intelligence suggesting that certain individuals were preparing to engage in activities aimed at influencing voter turnout.
“These activities, classified as voter suppression, include the offering of inducements to sway voter choice, as well as the use of intimidation and threats to discourage or manipulate voters. Intelligence assessments indicate that both strategies were under active consideration.”
Gold commander for the election, acting DCP (Operations), Curt Simon, said the public disclosure of this intelligence appears to have disrupted these planned activities.
“Ongoing monitoring via social media surveillance and human intelligence networks has indicated a noticeable reduction in related rhetoric,” Simon said, noting that despite this observed decline, the police will continue to execute “intelligence-driven operations, leveraging expertise and strategies honed during the recent state of emergency”.
The police say, together with the Trinidad and Tobago Defence Force (TTDF), they remain firmly committed to providing a safe, secure, and professional environment for all election-related activities.
“A robust and highly visible police presence will be maintained to ensure public safety and to preserve the democratic process.”
The polls are coming four months ahead of the second anniversary of the PNM’s consecutive victory in the 2015 general elections, when then prime minister Dr. Keith Rowley led the party to a 22-19 victory over the UNC.
Rowley has bowed out of active politics after 45 years, and his successor, the 50-year-old senior counsel, Stuart Young, has been urging the electorate to ensure a third consecutive victory for the PNM.
“I want you to imagine a Trinidad and Tobago where the government and state services don’t frustrate you. A government and a Trinidad and Tobago where the state sector works for you and with you, where services are faster and simpler, where your time and your dignity are respected in every Government office….
“When you go to the polls, we are promising to transform the government to deliver real results for you. We are working to make sure your pensions are paid on time. We are working to automate your access to pensions so that the long delays and the waits are a thing of the past,” are among the promises being made by Young.
His main challenger for the prime minister’s position will be Kamla Persad Bissessar. She became the country’s first woman to head a government when she led her UNC-dominated People’s Partnership coalition to office in 2010.
Opposition Leader Kamla Persad Bissessar
Now, at age 73, and seeking to avoid a hat-trick of consecutive defeats in general elections, Persad Bissessar is again leading a UNC-dominated coalition into the elections that includes trade unions and smaller fringe opposition parties.
The senior counsel has sought to brush aside suggestions that she is now too frail to head a government in this oil-rich twin-island republic, telling supporters that while her body may appear frail and small, it houses the enduring spirit and boundless love of a mother who is prepared to put her country first.
“My body may have been because of the years of battering, bruising, humiliation, ridicule, abuse, and insults. I have been called the worst things anyone can be called. I have been called jamette, which I’m not; I’ve been called drunk, which I’m not; I’ve been called dog, I’ve been called every nasty word in between, but to you, my loving UNC rank-and-file members, I was always Kamla. Do not fear! Kamla is here!” she told the coalition’s rally on Saturday.
“Yes, I accept that my body may appear frail and small, but inside this body is the mind and heart of a mother that is filled with love. I have been and will always be a mother to all of you. Was I perfect? No, I wasn’t, and I humbly say sorry to my loyal rank-and-file UNC,” she added.
Crime and the state of the economy have emerged as key issues in the campaign for the election.
Former foreign affairs minister Ralph Maraj, who served in both PNM and UNC administrations, in his Sunday column on the eve of the election, wrote, “This is a broke, blood-soaked nation, people. Rescue Trinidad and Tobago tomorrow”.
He said the government has ignored the nation’s most urgent economic imperative of the past 10 years, and that is “developing new foreign revenue streams.
“Indeed, Rowley found diversification an “annoying” word. Worse, in 2018, they insanely shut down our oil refinery, which, as (former Finance Minister Colm) Imbert himself admitted, earned more foreign exchange than it spent.
“Consequently, this country used over US$7.65 billion in the last six years to purchase fuel for the refinery that once produced. Madness! Their disastrous legacy will make generations suffer,” said Maraj.
But the Caribbean Information and Credit Rating Services Ltd (Caricris), whose shareholders include the central banks of Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, the Eastern Caribbean as well as Suriname, this month reaffirmed the credit rating of CariAA (foreign and local currency ratings) on its regional rating scale to the Trinidad and Tobago government, a rating sustained from the last assessment of the government’s creditworthiness in October 2023. The scale goes from CariAAA to CariBB.
In a statement on April 25, Caricris, whose shareholders also include the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), said the government’s rating, in comparison to other Caribbean nations, is high and also maintained a stable outlook on the ratings based on projected macroeconomic stability over the next 12 to 18 months.
“These projections are based on a low but positive real GDP (gross domestic product) growth rate over the period as well as continued financial sector soundness, robustness in Trinidad and Tobago’s sovereign wealth fund over the medium term, and continued adequacy in international reserves and import cover,” it said.
The decision by the United States government in early April to revoked the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) licence that had been granted to Trinidad and Tobago to allow Shell, the National Gas Company (NGC) and contractors to explore, produce, and export natural gas from the Venezuelan Dragon Gas Field, has provided additional ammunition to the opposition parties that have argued that the current administration has placed “all its economic eggs in that basket”.
The licence had been valid until October 31, 2025, and enabled Trinidad and Tobago to pay for gas in various currencies and through humanitarian measures. Trinidad and Tobago had also secured a 30-year exploration and production license from the government of Venezuela for the Dragon gas field on December 21, 2023.
Washington has also revoked the Cocuina-Manakin licence that was granted to Port of Spain on May 31, 2024. The US billion-dollar deal would have resulted in Trinidad and Tobago developing fields to produce gas, which will be imported through a pipeline from Venezuela to platforms off the northwest coast.
“Stuart Young went to Venezuela, not once, not twice, 13 times. He and Rowley are the sole causes of any US sanctions on Trinidad and Tobago,” Persad Bissessar said.
The Energy Chamber of Trinidad & Tobago (ECTT) has described as “disappointing” but “not unexpected” the US decision, noting “this is disappointing news, but not unexpected given the previous cancellation of other general and special licenses for companies working in Venezuela.”
But in his latest meeting with US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, Prime Minister Young was told “we will work closely to develop a solution that meets US goals on Venezuela without hurting Trinidad and Tobago…:
“Vote for me as your Prime Minister and I will fight for that (Venezuelan) gas. I will fight like I have never fought before,” Young told PNM supporters at the party’s final rally on Saturday night.
But apart from the Dragon gas deal, the decision by the Rowley administration to shut down the loss-making Petrotrin oil refinery at Point-a-Pierre has also been a campaign matter.
The Trinidad Petroleum Holdings Limited (TPHL) has confirmed it is continuing negotiations with Nigerian energy company Oando to restart the refinery, the president general of the Oilfields Workers’ Trade Union (OWTU) Ancel Roget, has vowed that any deal signed close to the general election “will not be honoured” by a future UNC government.
The OWTU is among the trade unions supporting the UNC coalition, and Roget has told the public meeting that the refinery closure caused immense suffering to families.
“Since Stuart Young shut down Petrotrin, thousands of families have suffered. That will change on April 28,” he said.
In 2024, Trinidad and Tobago recorded a record number of homicides, reaching 625, and so far this year, the country has registered more than 100.
In January this year, former finance minister and professor of practice at the University of the West Indies (UWI), Winston Dookeran, told the “Dialogue-Leadership of the Americas” that rising violence from organized criminal groups crossed the red line in Trinidad and Tobago.
“At the core of this complex issue is the ease of trafficking high-powered small arms and ammunition, an issue of global dimensions, with the Caribbean, located between North and South America, being an ‘open’ border.”
Trinidad and Tobago is emerging from a state of emergency (SoE) that the authorities had imposed in December last year, and Persad Bissessar, in radio and television advertisements, claims that her administration will deal effectively with the situation.
“The first duty of a government is to keep its citizens safe and secure,” Persad-Bissessar said while noting a SoE could have saved many of the lives lost since the Rowley Administration took office in 2015.
But Rowley, who has been on the campaign trail, said the state of emergency declared by Persad Bissessar’s government in 2011 and which was aimed at curbing violent crime, “didn’t put an end to the behaviour of the criminals.
CMC/pr/ir/2025