Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) chair­man Jack Warn­er, the Min­is­ter of Works and In­fra­struc­ture, will eas­i­ly de­feat Ash­vani Ma­habir and two oth­ers for the post in the par­ty's March 24 in­ter­nal elec­tions. That is the find­ing of a re­cent poll by the North Amer­i­can Caribbean Teach­ers As­so­ci­a­tion (Nac­ta), which al­so pre­dicts that the Gov­ern­ment min­is­ters Dr Roodal Mooni­lal and Su­ruj Ram­bachan will win re-elec­tion for deputy lead­ers. Dr Fuad Khan is al­so a favourite.

How­ev­er, Nac­ta says a bat­tle is brew­ing for vice-chair­man be­tween Khadi­jah Ameen, the chair­man of the Tu­na­puna/Pi­ar­co Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion and Sen­ate vice-pres­i­dent Lyn­di­ra Ou­dit. Ac­cord­ing to the poll, high pro­file in­cum­bents and those serv­ing in Gov­ern­ment po­si­tions en­joy an ad­van­tage over un­known chal­lengers.

"Dis­grun­tled sup­port­ers of the UNC are sup­port­ing chal­lengers but they are not enough to un­seat the in­cum­bents who en­joy greater ac­cess to re­sources to bring out vot­ers to cast bal­lots for them," a re­port on the poll stat­ed. "Many UNC sup­port­ers said they have not checked their names on the list to ver­i­fy el­i­gi­bil­i­ty to vote and they will not come out to vote be­cause Kam­la is not on the bal­lot.

"The find­ings al­so show that un­like the UNC in­ter­nal elec­tion of two years ago when Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar chal­lenged and de­feat­ed Bas­deo Pan­day for the lead­er­ship of the par­ty in an ex­hil­a­rat­ing and dra­mat­ic cam­paign, next week­end's elec­tions are turn­ing out to be a very low-key af­fair with none of the ex­cite­ments of the past."

Ac­cord­ing to Nac­ta, the Gen­er­a­tion Next and UNC Sol­diers slates are not show­ing much im­pact in con­tests for top po­si­tions but could do well in low­er lev­el po­si­tions.