The Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA) and Con­gress of the Peo­ple (COP) are both wel­com­ing for­eign elec­tion ob­servers for the April 28 polls.

Over the week­end, the For­eign Af­fairs Min­istry re­vealed that elec­tion ob­servers agreed to come from the Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ty (Cari­com) and the Com­mon­wealth to ob­serve the par­lia­men­tary elec­tions. How­ev­er, the state­ment al­so re­vealed that the Carter Cen­ter had not in­di­cat­ed its abil­i­ty to send a mis­sion.

NTA leader Gary Grif­fith said while the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) may be scep­ti­cal about Cari­com ob­servers, he has no qualms about them.

“We need to un­der­stand that Cari­com hav­ing the ob­servers here, it is more than enough. Ob­vi­ous­ly, if it is that in­ter­na­tion­al ob­servers come from the Carter Cen­ter or wher­ev­er the more the mer­ri­er. But at this time, the NTA, I think that will be more than enough for us to feel con­fi­dent to know that this elec­tion will be free and fair. The EBC so far have shown they are above board, they are not in bed with any oth­er po­lit­i­cal par­ty. Hope­ful­ly, the vast ma­jor­i­ty of the coun­try will ac­cept the re­sults...when the re­sults come out on the 28th of April.”

COP leader Prakash Ra­mad­har al­so high­light­ed the im­por­tance of these ob­servers.

“I do not want an elec­tion to be crit­i­cised with al­le­ga­tions of im­pro­pri­ety if it is that there was no im­pro­pri­ety. If there is im­pro­pri­ety I want it to be iden­ti­fied and for those who are re­spon­si­ble to be held to ac­count.”

The UNC has pre­vi­ous­ly raised con­cerns about the in­clu­sion of Cari­com ob­servers to mon­i­tor these elec­tions, cit­ing a po­ten­tial con­flict of in­ter­est. The par­ty point­ed to the fact that Cari­com’s as­sis­tant sec­re­tary-gen­er­al, Eliz­a­beth Solomon, is the wife of for­mer at­tor­ney gen­er­al Regi­nald Ar­mour.

For­mer prime min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley had al­so con­sis­tent­ly as­sert­ed that Cari­com re­mains an in­de­pen­dent and ad­e­quate body to over­see the elec­toral process. He an­nounced in De­cem­ber last year that an in­vi­ta­tion was be­ing pre­pared for Cari­com to ob­serve the polls. The an­nounce­ment came dur­ing the De­cem­ber 9 par­lia­men­tary de­bate on the Elec­tion and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion’s (EBC) 2024 Re­port on the Re­view of Con­stituen­cy Bound­aries.

It was dur­ing that de­bate that he dis­missed the list of 16 for­eign en­ti­ties out­lined by Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar in her Sep­tem­ber 16 let­ter, in which she called for a broad­er group of in­ter­na­tion­al ob­servers to be in­vit­ed for the up­com­ing elec­tion.

How­ev­er, the Com­mon­wealth Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al and Carter Cen­tre were sent by Row­ley’s suc­ces­sor, Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young. The let­ters were sent on March 19 and March 21, re­spec­tive­ly. Young was sworn in as PM on March 17.

Guardian Me­dia reached out to Per­sad-Bisses­sar, Pa­tri­ot­ic Front leader Mick­ela Pan­day, To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty leader Far­ley Au­gus­tine, and Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots leader Wat­son Duke for com­ment on the in­clu­sion of Com­mon­wealth ob­servers — and the ab­sence of the Carter Cen­ter. None had re­spond­ed up to the time of pub­li­ca­tion.