Da­reece Po­lo

Se­nior Re­porter

da­reece.po­lo@guardian.co.tt

The Leader of the Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA) Gary Grif­fith has ex­pressed con­fi­dence that a union with the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) will work bet­ter than the Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship (PP) ad­min­is­tra­tion based on one main in­gre­di­ent–com­mu­ni­ca­tion.

Grif­fith com­ment­ed dur­ing an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, where he re­spond­ed to ques­tions on whether he was cer­tain the al­liance could work con­sid­er­ing the even­tu­al frac­tur­ing of the PP ad­min­is­tra­tion. The PP gov­ern­ment bare­ly sur­vived its five years in of­fice, los­ing to the PNM in 2015.

How­ev­er, the NTA head re­mained adamant that this time the arrange­ment will be a suc­cess.

“I give the as­sur­ance to the pub­lic that this time, this is go­ing to work,” he said.

“The thing is I have a very good de­gree of com­mu­ni­ca­tion with the po­lit­i­cal leader of the UNC and that is the first thing that will take place to en­sure that any re­la­tion­ship works,” he added.

The NTA will con­test 31 of the 141 elec­toral dis­tricts. This in­cludes the Diego Mar­tin, Tu­na­puna, and San Juan/Laven­tille Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tions as well as the Ari­ma and Point Fortin Bor­ough Cor­po­ra­tions and the Port-of-Spain City Cor­po­ra­tion.

Though Grif­fith’s par­ty is par­tic­i­pat­ing in the elec­tions, he will not be vy­ing for any of the po­si­tions him­self.

De­spite this, the for­mer com­mis­sion­er of po­lice be­lieves the NTA, UNC and Garvin Nicholas’ Move­ment for Na­tion­al De­vel­op­ment (MND) will be able to oust Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley and break the sev­en-sev­en tie come Au­gust 14.

“It is not about the PNM. The PNM has done a lot to help de­vel­op the coun­try, just as the UNC has done but this R-PNM, the Row­ley PNM is what needs to go,” he said.

“Join­ing with the 300-thou­sand-odd UNC sup­port­ers means one thing, the an­ni­hi­la­tion of the PNM de­mo­c­ra­t­i­cal­ly to have Kei­th Row­ley re­moved from of­fice be­cause what we are see­ing now in this coun­try is a de­mo­c­ra­t­ic dic­ta­tor­ship,” he added.

Grif­fith stat­ed that the fail­ure of the Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship ought not to be blamed on the UNC alone, as he re­mained dead set that their union would be vic­to­ri­ous.

Fur­ther­more, Grif­fith has urged oth­er po­lit­i­cal par­ties to join the al­liance as he called on cit­i­zens to stop be­ing syco­phants and in­stead, vote based on per­for­mance.

“I will ask the coun­try ... We need to tone it down a bit and stop get­ting in­to this sit­u­a­tion where we be­lieve that any­one who is wear­ing red or yel­low or blue is the com­mon en­e­my. That is what has di­vid­ed the coun­try,” he said.

More­over, Grif­fith claimed the State has with­held funds from cor­po­ra­tions that are held by the Op­po­si­tion.

“The prob­lem ex­ists be­cause of the fail­ure of lo­cal gov­ern­ment, is be­cause of that type of ha­tred, bit­ter­ness, ar­ro­gance, where the PNM may de­lib­er­ate­ly with­hold funds to stop the oth­er sev­en re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions from hav­ing what they re­quire,” he said.

Guardian Me­dia reached out to PNM PRO Faris Al-Rawi and Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Fos­ter Cum­mings about Grif­fith’s claims about fund­ing but calls to both men went unan­swered.