The up­com­ing Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion (PSA) elec­tion, sched­uled for March 10, 2025, has been de­scribed as a crit­i­cal junc­ture for pub­lic of­fi­cers in Trinidad and To­ba­go. 

Unit­ed Pub­lic Of­fi­cers (UPO) leader Oral Saun­ders says he is spear­head­ing a cam­paign cen­tred on trans­paren­cy, fi­nan­cial ac­count­abil­i­ty, and in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions re­form, while Deputy Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary can­di­date Ak­il Nan­coo said his team is com­mit­ted to con­sti­tu­tion­al re­form and free and fair elec­tions.

Speak­ing to the Guardian Me­dia on Tues­day about what he called the PSA’s gov­er­nance chal­lenges, Saun­ders ex­pressed deep con­cerns about the vir­tu­al man­age­ment of the gen­er­al coun­cil meet­ings, which is the PSA’s sec­ond-high­est de­ci­sion-mak­ing body. “The Gen­er­al Coun­cil al­so func­tions as the fi­nan­cial com­mit­tee, yet it con­tin­ues to meet vir­tu­al­ly un­der the ad­min­is­tra­tion’s con­trol.  Mem­bers have no idea who is present or what de­ci­sions are be­ing made. This lack of trans­paren­cy must end,” Saun­ders stat­ed.

He al­so re­flect­ed on past fi­nan­cial con­tro­ver­sies with­in the PSA, call­ing them un­ac­cept­able.

“We’ve seen the worst – mon­ey trans­fers be­tween banks with­out ac­count­abil­i­ty. Shock­ing­ly, some of the in­di­vid­u­als in­volved are now vy­ing to lead the PSA again. Un­der our lead­er­ship, every dol­lar will be ac­count­ed for in line with the Con­sti­tu­tion,” he vowed. 

Saun­ders as­sured mem­bers that the UPO team, in­clud­ing their trea­sur­er John­ny Be­har­ry, an ac­count­ing of­fi­cer from the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion, will pri­ori­tise fi­nan­cial over­sight and en­sure clear re­port­ing.

Nan­coo, high­light­ing his team’s agen­da, ex­plained that con­sti­tu­tion­al re­form is cen­tral to their vi­sion. “We need to re­store faith in the elec­toral process. Ob­servers, po­ten­tial­ly from the Elec­tions and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion (EBC), must over­see elec­tions to en­sure they are free, fair, and trans­par­ent,” Nan­coo said. 

He al­so point­ed to the ir­reg­u­lar­i­ties of the 2020 elec­tions, which he said were plagued by de­lays and mis­con­duct al­le­ga­tions.

“Count­ing 1,700 votes took over five days, with ques­tion­able shifts in the re­sults. The Con­sti­tu­tion lacks pro­vi­sions for in­de­pen­dent over­sight, and that is a crit­i­cal gap we will ad­dress,” he added.

Saun­ders not­ed that the PSA had sev­ered ties with Cipri­ani Labour Col­lege and Pub­lic Ser­vices In­ter­na­tion­al, leav­ing rep­re­sen­ta­tives un­equipped to ef­fec­tive­ly ad­vo­cate for mem­bers. 

“Our Deputy Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary, Ak­il Nan­coo, is pur­su­ing a Mas­ter’s in In­dus­tri­al Re­la­tions through a Unit­ed Na­tions schol­ar­ship. He will lead ef­forts to rein­tro­duce train­ing to em­pow­er our rep­re­sen­ta­tives,” Saun­ders an­nounced.

Saun­ders said the UPO is com­mit­ted to im­ple­ment­ing Cir­cu­lar 1 of 1973, which fos­ters col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween union rep­re­sen­ta­tives and man­age­ment.

“This is about ad­dress­ing griev­ances col­lec­tive­ly be­fore they be­come protests. We want to re­store di­a­logue and re­spect in in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions,” Saun­ders ex­plained.

Both Saun­ders and Nan­coo agree that the elec­tion rep­re­sents a turn­ing point for pub­lic of­fi­cers. 

“This is the most im­por­tant elec­tion in the lives of cur­rent mem­bers. Not vot­ing is en­dors­ing poor rep­re­sen­ta­tion,” Saun­ders de­clared. “Our sym­bol, the star, rep­re­sents light and guid­ance. We’re urg­ing mem­bers to re­claim their union and re­turn to ef­fec­tive rep­re­sen­ta­tion.”