Po­lit­i­cal an­a­lysts Dr In­di­ra Ram­per­sad and Dr Shane Mo­hammed say age should not be a fac­tor in whether or not po­lit­i­cal lead­ers re­main in of­fice.

The an­a­lysts spoke yes­ter­day fol­low­ing the de­ci­sion by US Pres­i­dent Joe Biden to step down from run­ning for a sec­ond term in of­fice.

Be­fore his de­ci­sion, con­cerns grew about Biden’s abil­i­ty to seek re-elec­tion fol­low­ing his per­for­mance against Re­pub­li­can nom­i­nee and for­mer pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump dur­ing a de­bate. Biden was crit­i­cised as be­ing too old for of­fice with some even in­sin­u­at­ing that he may have de­men­tia. There were al­so con­cerns about his health and nu­mer­ous calls with­in the De­mo­c­ra­t­ic par­ty for Biden to step aside.

He did so on Sun­day. Hours lat­er, Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley con­grat­u­lat­ed Biden for tak­ing the “bold and coura­geous” de­ci­sion to step down.

But both Row­ley and Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar have been called on to re­tire. Row­ley, who turns 75 in Oc­to­ber and Per­sad-Bisses­sar, 72, nev­er in­di­cat­ed a de­sire to do so.

Ram­per­sad said the age of the po­lit­i­cal lead­ers should not be an is­sue as com­pe­ten­cy is more im­por­tant. She said as elect­ed of­fi­cers, the par­ties they rep­re­sent, and the elec­torate should de­cide when a leader needs to step down.

“To just go and tell po­lit­i­cal lead­ers to step down just like that, and ex­pect them to, that is not the process,” she said adding that like Biden, that is some­thing the po­lit­i­cal lead­ers must de­cide on.

Asked whether there should be an age lim­it for po­lit­i­cal lead­ers, Ram­per­sad said the bet­ter ques­tion is whether there should be a term lim­it for lead­ers.

“I think there should be an age re­quire­ment be­cause some­times they get too old and they don’t want to move, but I al­so think there should be a term lim­it. I think we should have a two-term lim­it like in the US,” she said.

Mo­hammed stressed that ser­vice be­fore self should be the de­cid­ing fac­tor on whether lead­ers con­tin­ue. He said the em­pha­sis should not be so much on age. He said the is­sue should be more about com­pe­ten­cy.

“Ob­vi­ous­ly there should be a (an age) lim­it. We’re mov­ing in an age where no­body wants an 80-year-old prime min­is­ter. No­body wants a 75-year-old prime min­is­ter. Ob­vi­ous­ly, the idea of ca­pac­i­ty and health and well­ness and men­tal ca­pac­i­ty and cog­ni­tive come in­to play. But, I do be­lieve there are peo­ple who are much younger who as­pire to be prime min­is­ter of the coun­try they can’t even speak about a pol­i­cy and more than one is­sue af­fect­ing us,” Mo­hammed said.

He said that talk was cheap and some as­pired to of­fice with­out want­i­ng to im­prove the cit­i­zen­ry and the stan­dard of liv­ing.

He added, “Age is not just on­ly a fac­tor, there is some­thing I like to think peo­ple need to know what their per­son­al lim­i­ta­tions are. There are many peo­ple who as­pire to be prime min­is­ter. As­pir­ing to be prime min­is­ter is not about the of­fice or the pres­tige it is about the ser­vice to the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go.”