Kamla promises real local government reform

Po­lit­i­cal Leader of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress, Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, is promis­ing to en­sure that lo­cal gov­ern­ment re­form be­comes a re­al­i­ty, once the UNC wins the next gen­er­al elec­tion.

The UNC po­lit­i­cal leader made the de­c­la­ra­tion last night, dur­ing vic­to­ry cel­e­bra­tions fol­low­ing the re­sults of the 2019 Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tions.

Dur­ing yes­ter­day’s lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tion, the UNC man­aged to win the San­gre Grande seat, thus re­al­is­ing a 7-7 tie with the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM), in terms of the num­ber of re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions each par­ty con­trols.

Mrs Per­sad-Bisses­sar says her vi­sion of re­form will be more bal­anced and eq­ui­table, for all parts of the coun­try.

“Any lo­cal gov­ern­ment re­form must take in­to ac­count the land mass of the cor­po­ra­tions, as well as the num­ber of vot­ers in the cor­po­ra­tions,” she told sup­port­ers last night. “So whilst the PNM can win Ari­ma or Point Fortin, which is a few thou­sand votes, we have to go in­to oth­er ar­eas, where the vot­ers are over a hun­dred thou­sand. So any lo­cal gov­ern­ment re­form must have eq­ui­ty in the bound­aries and the com­po­si­tion of the elec­torate,” she ar­gues. “And a UNC gov­ern­ment will make that change when the time comes.”

Ac­cord­ing to the UNC po­lit­i­cal leader, an im­por­tant foun­da­tion was laid yes­ter­day, for the up­com­ing Gen­er­al Elec­tions in 2020.

She said the peo­ple have spo­ken clear­ly that they want change from the PNM, as ev­i­denced by the gains the UNC made.

Mrs Per­sad-Bisses­sar says the UNC got more votes across the coun­try than the PNM. She says de­spite what the PNM may say, the re­al­i­ty is that the pop­u­lar vote went to the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress.