Gail Alexan­der

A keen fight's ahead as can­di­dates from at least six po­lit­i­cal par­ties will to­day reg­is­ter with the Elec­tion and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion for the No­vem­ber 28 Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment polls.

Can­di­dates will present their nom­i­na­tion pa­pers to the EBC's 53 re­turn­ing of­fi­cers at lo­ca­tions around Trinidad, EBC chief elec­tions of­fi­cer Ramesh Nanan has said. A to­tal of 137 seats in the 14 mu­nic­i­pal cor­po­ra­tions around Trinidad are be­ing con­test­ed in the elec­tion.

The Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment - now in Gov­ern­ment - won eight cor­po­ra­tions in the last 2013 Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment polls. The Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress, now in Op­po­si­tion, holds six.The PNM, which is con­test­ing all 137 seats, has a full slate, in­clud­ing 90 new­com­ers and a large num­ber of youths.

Com­ment­ing on the race, PNM PRO Stu­art Young said, "We aim to hold our eight cor­po­ra­tions - we tar­get all oth­ers."

The PNM's line­up in­cludes for­mer UNC Cu­mu­to-Tamana coun­cil­lor Ra­jku­mar Bha­ga­loo, who has joined the PNM and is con­test­ing in the same area. Al­so with the PNM is Shar­da Singh, daugh­ter of de­ceased lo­cal gov­ern­ment min­is­ter Dhan­raj Singh, who served un­der the Bas­deo Pan­day UNC regime. She is con­test­ing in Mon­trose/Lange Park in the Ch­agua­nas Bor­ough Cor­po­ra­tion area - one of the key elec­tion bat­tle­grounds.

The Op­po­si­tion UNC is al­so field­ing a full slate, in­clud­ing a sig­nif­i­cant per­cent­age of new­com­ers and youths. The en­tire team will be re­vealed at tonight's UNC meet­ing in Mon­trose, Ch­agua­nas. UNC chair­man David Lee said their star can­di­date is West In­dies crick­et leg­end Raph­ick Ju­madeen, chair­man of se­lec­tors for the T&T Crick­et Board.

"A pil­lar of Mara­bel­la's com­mu­ni­ty, he's con­test­ing Mara­bel­la East in the San Fer­nan­do City Cor­po­ra­tion," Lee said.

"We al­so have out­stand­ing young peo­ple from sport­ing to cul­tur­al and pro­fes­sion­al back­grounds, in­clud­ing youth crick­eter Adri­an Ali - con­test­ing Ca­roni Sa­van­nah Road - and singer Amit Sook­nanan (Warn­er Vil­lage, Aranguez)."

He added, "We've con­tin­ued our thrust for gen­der par­i­ty and em­pow­er­ment with a sig­nif­i­cant num­ber of fe­male can­di­dates and are con­fi­dent of our team's abil­i­ty to re­claim lost po­lit­i­cal ground and claim new ter­ri­to­ry."

The In­de­pen­dent Lib­er­al Par­ty, which launched its cam­paign yes­ter­day, had re­ceived nom­i­nees for the Ch­agua­nas and San­gre Grande cor­po­ra­tions. But the ILP has de­cid­ed to fo­cus sole­ly on all seats in the Ch­agua­nas cor­po­ra­tion, leader Rekha Ramjit said.

"I was pleas­ant­ly sur­prised at the nom­i­nee turnout we re­ceived but Ch­agua­nas is our base. Our sup­port is there. All eyes will be on Ch­agua­nas in this elec­tion."

The Move­ment for So­cial Jus­tice al­so launched its cam­paign in San Fer­nan­do yes­ter­day for its tar­get of two cor­po­ra­tions and one seat. MSJ is con­test­ing all seats in the Ari­ma and Point Fortin cor­po­ra­tions, as well as one seat in the Tu­na­puna/Pi­ar­co cor­po­ra­tion - the San­ta Rosa/Blan­chisseuse seat.

MSJ leader David Ab­du­lah said by the next Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment elec­tions, the MSJ will be in a bet­ter po­si­tion to con­test seats in each of the 14 cor­po­ra­tions. The Con­gress of the Peo­ple is field­ing nine can­di­dates in seats in San Fer­nan­do, Siparia and Tu­na­puna/Pi­ar­co.

Apart from new­com­ers, COP chair­man Jami­son Ba­hadur is con­test­ing the Curepe/Pasea seat in the Tu­na­puna/Pi­ar­co area.The Na­tion­al Sol­i­dar­i­ty As­sem­bly, com­pris­ing ex-sug­ar work­ers, is al­so ex­pect­ed to con­test in Ch­agua­nas and San­gre Grande and oth­er seats.

Apart from par­ties, the EBC is al­so cater­ing for in­de­pen­dent can­di­dates.