The first an­niver­sary on Tues­day of the huge vic­to­ry by Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress in the April 28, 2026, gen­er­al elec­tion should have prompt­ed a great deal of in­tro­spec­tion by both the Gov­ern­ment and the Op­po­si­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go, as both po­lit­i­cal par­ties have a re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to their sup­port­ers to un­der­take re­al­is­tic as­sess­ments of their re­spec­tive po­si­tions with 20 per cent of the elec­tion cy­cle com­plet­ed.

Led by vet­er­an politi­cian Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, the cur­rent ad­min­is­tra­tion has a great deal to be proud of, as the Gov­ern­ment has de­liv­ered on sev­er­al of the promis­es it made in the elec­tion cam­paign, most par­tic­u­lar­ly the com­mit­ment to work­ers rep­re­sent­ed by the Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion of a salary in­crease of 10 per cent.

But if the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) were to as­sess its own per­for­mance in the year since its crush­ing de­feat, the par­ty that has dom­i­nat­ed T&T pol­i­tics for about 47 of its 64 years of In­de­pen­dence, would have to con­clude, as its po­lit­i­cal leader, Pen­ne­lope Beck­les, has done, that it is 6 out 10.

While that is not an out­stand­ing score, it at least has the ben­e­fit of hon­esty.

From her elec­tion as the first fe­male po­lit­i­cal leader of the PNM on May 6, 2025, Ms Beck­les has been slow to re­spond to the many op­por­tu­ni­ties to score po­lit­i­cal points against the Gov­ern­ment. That has al­lowed some of her par­lia­men­tary col­leagues to grab the news cy­cle be­fore she does, mak­ing it seem as though she is not in con­trol of the par­ty.

If the PNM has as­pi­ra­tions to re­turn to the cor­ri­dors of pow­er in T&T, it must co­a­lesce around its leader and it must speak with one voice, prefer­ably that of the Op­po­si­tion Leader.

Two ex­am­ples of what may be per­ceived as in­ter­nal in­dis­ci­pline with­in the PNM, a par­ty that has long prid­ed it­self on just that, stand out: For­mer prime min­is­ter Stu­art Young flies to Venezuela and is pho­tographed shak­ing hands with that coun­try’s act­ing Pres­i­dent, Del­cy Ro­driguez.

While that pho­to op may be viewed as one-up­man­ship over the Gov­ern­ment, which is strug­gling to be heard in Cara­cas, the ques­tion is, did Mr Young at least in­form his po­lit­i­cal leader that he was trav­el­ling to Venezuela?

The oth­er in­ci­dent this week was Mr Young de­clin­ing to join his col­leagues at the front of City Hall in Port-of-Spain, where the par­ty marked the one-year an­niver­sary of the gen­er­al elec­tion loss with a State of the Re­pub­lic meet­ing.

That event gave Ms Beck­les the op­por­tu­ni­ty to point out the thou­sands of most­ly low-wage work­ers who have lost their jobs since the UNC won the gen­er­al elec­tion, as well as re­peat the par­ty’s claim that lo­cal gov­ern­ment cor­po­ra­tions con­trolled by the PNM have been un­der­fund­ed, com­pared to those con­trolled by the rul­ing par­ty.

It was writ­ten by 19th-cen­tu­ry British Prime Min­is­ter Ben­jamin Dis­raeli that “a strong op­po­si­tion is the back­bone of a healthy democ­ra­cy.”

What Trinidad and To­ba­go’s democ­ra­cy needs now is a ma­ture and un­frag­ment­ed Op­po­si­tion.