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Wednesday, July 30, 2025

Panday thinks about forming new party

Warn­er hopes it will merge with ILP

by

20140412

Founder of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) Bas­deo Pan­day says he will con­sid­er form­ing his own po­lit­i­cal par­ty if UNC in­ter­nal elec­tions, which are sched­uled to take place this year, are not free and fair.This news from Pan­day was mu­sic to the ears of in­ter­im leader of the In­de­pen­dent Lib­er­al (ILP) Jack Warn­er who said he had no prob­lem merg­ing the ILP with a new par­ty formed by Pan­day to con­test the 2015 gen­er­al elec­tions.

Pan­day said peo­ple have been en­cour­ag­ing him to con­test the UNC's elec­tion, which has been de­layed by 16 months. It was sup­posed to be held last Jan­u­ary.In re­sponse to calls from UNC mem­bers, the vet­er­an politi­cian said he should be able to con­test any post in the UNC elec­tion if it is free and fair. He claimed the 2010 elec­tions were stolen and if on the next oc­ca­sion those con­test­ing the elec­tion are in con­trol of the ma­chin­ery "the re­sults will be de­ter­mined be­fore the first vote is cast".

Pan­day was de­feat­ed by cur­rent UNC po­lit­i­cal leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar in the 2010 in­ter­nal polls.He told the Sun­day Guardian: "If the elec­tion is not free and fair, I in­vite a mass res­ig­na­tion from the UNC and the for­ma­tion of a new par­ty to con­test the elec­tions in 2015."Asked if he thinks he would get the sup­port from the peo­ple, Pan­day ad­mit­ted he could not say so for sure but it is worth a try.

Asked whether he would in­vite Warn­er's ILP to join forces with him in a new par­ty, Pan­day said: "If you form a par­ty you usu­al­ly go in the di­rec­tion of the mem­ber­ship and that is not pos­si­ble un­til you form the po­lit­i­cal par­ty."Warn­er said the UNC is crum­bling with those at the helm."This is not the par­ty Bas­deo Pan­day and I fought for years ago," he said, adding that he is will­ing "to join any par­ty whose ob­jec­tives are sim­i­lar to ours (ILP) and whose goals are the same".

"If it means that there are par­ties will­ing for us to have a grand coali­tion then I don't see a prob­lem," he saidThe Ch­agua­nas West MP said he has no in­ten­tion of form­ing a unit­ed front with the PNM: "That is not on the cards," Warn­er said.

An­a­lyst: A test­ing­ground for both men

Po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Maukesh Bas­deo not­ed that the 2010 in­ter­nal elec­tion Pan­day was de­feat­ed by Bisses­sar by a huge mar­gin. He said the pos­si­bil­i­ty of Pan­day form­ing a new par­ty and Warn­er join­ing him would re­sult an­oth­er po­lit­i­cal coali­tion."Will it be pow­er­ful enough to chal­lenge the UNC and the coali­tion of the COP, TOP and NJAC? I don't know. A lot is go­ing to hap­pen in the next cou­ple of months in re­la­tion to coali­tion pol­i­tics," Bas­deo said.

If Warn­er and Pan­day join forces it would present a chal­lenge to the PNM, he said.While Warn­er amassed a lot of votes in the Ch­agua­nas East by elec­tion, the same did not hap­pen for the ILP in the 2013 lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tion."All these things have to be tak­en in­to con­sid­er­a­tion...the pop­u­lar­i­ty of the leader with Warn­er hav­ing a lot of al­le­ga­tions sur­round­ing him."On the flip side, there are die-hard UNC sup­port­ers who still look up to Pan­day, he said.

"But be­ing out of ac­tive pol­i­tics for four years is a long time. What Pan­day would have to do is con­vince the UNC base that he is the cred­i­ble leader. It would be a test­ing ground for both men."Bas­deo said for­ma­tion of a new par­ty could change the dy­nam­ics of T&T's po­lit­i­cal land­scape: "What you are go­ing to see is a fur­ther split with­in the coali­tion of the PP. They are ob­vi­ous­ly go­ing to get peo­ple to grav­i­tate to­wards this new po­lit­i­cal ve­hi­cle."

An­oth­er in­ter­est­ing sce­nario could de­vel­op if cur­rent UNC mem­bers and gov­ern­ment min­is­ters who were on Pan­day's slate in 2010 cross the floor to go to their for­mer leader's side."That is what will be in­ter­est­ing. A lot of sce­nar­ios could play out here," Bas­deo said.


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