As To­ba­go en­ters the fi­nal stretch of cam­paign­ing ahead of Mon­day’s To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly Elec­tions, there is cau­tious but gen­uine hope that the is­land will pass this de­mo­c­ra­t­ic test peace­ful­ly and with ma­tu­ri­ty. In a re­gion and era where elec­tions can too eas­i­ly de­scend in­to ran­cour, in­tim­i­da­tion or worse, the calm tone of this cam­paign so far is worth ac­knowl­edg­ing—and pro­tect­ing.

The T&T Po­lice Ser­vice has of­fered a mea­sure of re­as­sur­ance. Ear­li­er this week, se­nior of­fi­cers con­firmed that no re­ports of bribery, in­tim­i­da­tion or vot­er ma­nip­u­la­tion have been re­ceived. Po­lice of­fi­cials al­so not­ed that risk as­sess­ments re­vealed no ma­jor con­cerns, meet­ings with all con­test­ing par­ties raised no red flags and the cam­paign pe­ri­od has been no­tice­ably calmer than in pre­vi­ous years.

To­bag­o­ni­ans have long prid­ed them­selves on a strong sense of com­mu­ni­ty and re­spect, even amid po­lit­i­cal ri­val­ry. Peace­ful elec­tions are not on­ly the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of the po­lice or elec­tion of­fi­cials; they de­pend on the con­duct of can­di­dates, ac­tivists and vot­ers alike. The ab­sence of re­port­ed wrong­do­ing so far should not breed com­pla­cen­cy but rather re­in­force the shared du­ty to keep the process clean to the very end.

A peace­ful elec­tion, how­ev­er, is mean­ing­ful on­ly if vot­ers have had a fair op­por­tu­ni­ty to weigh the is­sues that will shape To­ba­go’s fu­ture. On that score, the cam­paign has pre­sent­ed clear con­trasts be­tween the main po­lit­i­cal forces.

The To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty (TPP), led by Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine, has leaned heav­i­ly on its record in of­fice, point­ing to in­vest­ments in in­fra­struc­ture, ed­u­ca­tion, health­care and pub­lic sec­tor re­form, as well as ef­forts to mod­ernise the THA and di­ver­si­fy the econ­o­my. The TPP has al­so em­pha­sised the im­por­tance of main­tain­ing a co­op­er­a­tive re­la­tion­ship with the cen­tral gov­ern­ment, ar­gu­ing that col­lab­o­ra­tion is cru­cial to se­cur­ing fund­ing and ad­vanc­ing de­vel­op­ment projects on the is­land.

The Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM), mean­while, has sought to frame the elec­tion as a choice about ad­vo­ca­cy and au­ton­o­my. Its To­ba­go Coun­cil leader, An­cil Den­nis, has ac­cused the TPP of be­ing too ac­com­mo­dat­ing to the cen­tral gov­ern­ment and in­suf­fi­cient­ly vo­cal in de­fend­ing To­bag­on­ian in­ter­ests. The PNM has high­light­ed con­cerns about gov­er­nance, cost-of-liv­ing pres­sures and what it de­scribes as the risk of To­ba­go be­com­ing po­lit­i­cal­ly mar­gin­alised.

These dif­fer­ences have been sharp­ened by spe­cif­ic con­tro­ver­sies, in­clud­ing the dou­bling of road traf­fic fines and the de­bate over en­force­ment ex­er­cis­es. The in­stal­la­tion of a radar sys­tem near the ANR Robin­son In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port has al­so en­tered pub­lic dis­course, rais­ing ques­tions about trans­paren­cy, con­sul­ta­tion and po­ten­tial im­pacts on sur­round­ing com­mu­ni­ties. While there is no in­di­ca­tion that the radar is­sue will be cen­tral to Mon­day’s vote, it has be­come an­oth­er sym­bol of broad­er anx­i­eties about de­ci­sion-mak­ing, com­mu­ni­ca­tion and whose voic­es are be­ing heard.

Such ex­changes, how­ev­er heat­ed, are part of de­mo­c­ra­t­ic life. Vot­ers have heard as­sur­ances, ac­cu­sa­tions, de­fences and de­nials. They have seen lead­ers pressed on past state­ments and present po­si­tions. They have been in­vit­ed to con­sid­er whether promis­es align with records and whether loy­al­ty lies first with par­ty, gov­ern­ment or To­ba­go it­self.

As polling day ap­proach­es, the hope is twofold: that the calm ob­served so far holds, al­low­ing To­bag­o­ni­ans to vote free from fear or in­duce­ment; and that vot­ers go to the polls con­fi­dent they have lis­tened, re­flect­ed and de­cid­ed for them­selves. What­ev­er the out­come, a peace­ful, cred­i­ble elec­tion will strength­en To­ba­go’s in­sti­tu­tions and its voice.