The po­lit­i­cal land­scape of Trinidad and To­ba­go wit­nessed a shift ahead of to­mor­row’s Gen­er­al Elec­tion, as for­mer Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) Tabaquite MP, Ani­ta Haynes-Al­leyne, joined the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM).

For­mer deputy po­lit­i­cal leader of the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) Nafeesa Mo­hammed, who first backed the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) in 2020 af­ter decades in the PNM, is dou­bling down ahead of to­mor­row’s gen­er­al elec­tion—de­clar­ing she will not vote for the par­ty due to its record of weak gov­er­nance.

To­ba­go is in the spot­light for to­mor­row’s Gen­er­al Elec­tion, draw­ing sig­nif­i­cant na­tion­al at­ten­tion. While the is­land has just two seats–To­ba­go East and To­ba­go West–in the 41-mem­ber Par­lia­ment, there has been an in­crease in the num­ber of con­tenders vy­ing to rep­re­sent the is­land.

St Joseph’s Con­vent, Port-of-Spain, has emerged vic­to­ri­ous in the In­ter­na­tion­al Repa­ra­tions De­bate Com­pe­ti­tion, de­feat­ing Claren­don Col­lege of Ja­maica in the fi­nals held on Fri­day at the Cen­tre for Repa­ra­tions Re­search at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, Mona Cam­pus. The Na­tion­al Com­mit­tee on Repa­ra­tions (NCR) ex­tend­ed its heart­felt con­grat­u­la­tions to the team for their ex­cep­tion­al achieve­ment.

In a heart­break­ing farewell for 30-year-old nurse O’delle Lal­man-Bap­tiste—who was kid­napped and mur­dered—rel­a­tives and friends re­mem­bered her as a lov­ing and gen­er­ous per­son dur­ing her fu­ner­al ser­vice.

Po­lit­i­cal Leader of the Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA) Gary Grif­fith says the is­sue of cam­paign fi­nanc­ing must be ur­gent­ly ad­dressed ahead of any fur­ther elec­tion in T&T.

For­mer Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) MP for Tabaquite Ani­ta Haynes Al­leyne has ex­plained why she chose to ap­pear at to­day’s Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) ral­ly at Ed­die Hart Grounds, say­ing she re­mained com­mit­ted to “na­tion-build­ing pol­i­tics char­ac­terised by in­clu­sion and co-op­er­a­tion.”

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) has reaf­firmed its com­mit­ment to en­sur­ing a safe and se­cure en­vi­ron­ment as the na­tion ap­proach­es the Gen­er­al Elec­tion. Over the past month, the TTPS has been ac­tive­ly up­dat­ing the pub­lic on its readi­ness to main­tain peace and safe­guard the de­mo­c­ra­t­ic process dur­ing this crit­i­cal pe­ri­od.

Two mi­nor chil­dren who were pre­vi­ous­ly held in an or­phan­age in north­east Syr­ia have law­ful­ly ar­rived in Trinidad and To­ba­go, ac­cord­ing to a state­ment is­sued by at­tor­ney Criston J. Williams of Quan­tum Le­gal. Their ar­rival was fa­cil­i­tat­ed un­der a guardian­ship or­der is­sued by the High Court of Eng­land and Wales, with the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go (GoRTT) for­mal­ly par­tic­i­pat­ing in the pro­ceed­ings and ac­cept­ing ju­ris­dic­tion for their cit­i­zen­ship ap­pli­ca­tions.

The fam­i­ly of 11-year-old Adri­an­na Younge has called on the Gov­ern­ment to have the Fed­er­al Bu­reau of In­ves­ti­ga­tion (FBI) in the Unit­ed States or oth­er in­ter­na­tion­al law en­force­ment bod­ies to in­ves­ti­gate the young girl’s death.

World lead­ers and rank-and-file Catholic faith­ful bade farewell to Pope Fran­cis in a fu­ner­al Sat­ur­day that high­light­ed his con­cern for peo­ple on the pe­riph­eries and re­flect­ed his wish to be re­mem­bered as a sim­ple pas­tor. Though pres­i­dents and princes at­tend­ed the Mass in St. Pe­ter’s Square, pris­on­ers and mi­grants wel­comed Fran­cis’ cof­fin at his fi­nal rest­ing place in a basil­i­ca across town.

Af­ter weeks of ver­bal war, they're al­most at the end. Some peo­ple in down­town Port-of-Spain were seen wear­ing red jer­seys yes­ter­day. Oth­ers were in yel­low and to­day, when they all con­verge at their re­spec­tive ral­lies in their re­spec­tive colours - in large traf­fic jams - the war of words reach­es its peak. Any­thing they didn't say be­fore is now fair game. Here's what you may have missed from the plat­form: