Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

Se­nior Re­porter

The Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) To­ba­go Coun­cil has be­gun re­veal­ing its can­di­dates for the up­com­ing To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) elec­tion, even as Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) leader Wat­son Duke in­sists his par­ty re­mains the pace-set­ter in To­ba­go pol­i­tics.

Dur­ing the first three nights of its To­ba­go De­serves Bet­ter com­mu­ni­ty meet­ings, the PNM in­tro­duced Do­minic Kerr for the Bon Ac­cord/Crown Point dis­trict, Shone John for Rox­bor­ough/Ar­gyle, and Ster­ling Tim­o­thy for Bethel/New Grange.

The meet­ings, which be­gan on Mon­day at the Canaan Mul­ti-Pur­pose Fa­cil­i­ty, are part of a se­ries of is­land-wide con­ver­sa­tions sched­uled through­out this month.

Ac­cord­ing to the par­ty, the meet­ings are in­tend­ed to re-en­gage res­i­dents at the com­mu­ni­ty lev­el and present so­lu­tions to long-stand­ing con­cerns across To­ba­go. The se­ries will con­tin­ue in Ma­son Hall, Lam­beau, Hope, and Pa­tience Hill over the com­ing days.

The PNM has al­so con­firmed that its po­lit­i­cal leader, An­cil Den­nis, will con­test the Buc­coo/Mt Pleas­ant seat.

The par­ty said the ini­tia­tive was part of a broad­er ef­fort to re­build vot­er con­fi­dence and demon­strate the par­ty’s readi­ness to re­turn to gov­er­nance af­ter los­ing the 2021 THA elec­tion to the PDP.

But PDP leader Wat­son Duke, in an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, claimed that while oth­er po­lit­i­cal move­ments were un­veil­ing their can­di­dates and cam­paigns, they were all fol­low­ing a mod­el cre­at­ed by his par­ty.

“The on­ly po­lit­i­cal par­ty in the en­tire coun­try that start­ed to an­nounce can­di­dates way be­fore elec­tions was the PDP,” Duke said. “Go back to the 2017 elec­tion—in 2016, we start­ed as ear­ly as June and Ju­ly to an­nounce our can­di­dates. Every month, we were an­nounc­ing a can­di­date.”

He said the PDP’s ap­proach has in­flu­enced po­lit­i­cal ac­tiv­i­ty on the is­land. “What the PNM is do­ing is a copy-and-paste ide­ol­o­gy they would have got­ten from the PDP,” he added. “We are the leader in pol­i­tics in To­ba­go, and we will re­main the leader for a very long time. All the oth­er po­lit­i­cal or­gan­i­sa­tions will try to fol­low and pat­tern us.”

Duke said the PDP has adopt­ed a new strat­e­gy this elec­tion cy­cle to pro­tect its cam­paign ideas from be­ing copied. “This PDP is now op­er­at­ing in se­cre­cy and act­ing in pub­lic. We plan in se­cret and we act in pub­lic now. We’re not putting our plans out there again be­cause those who are steal­ing ideas will steal our plans.”

The THA’s cur­rent term ends on De­cem­ber 10, and the elec­tion is ex­pect­ed to be called soon af­ter the As­sem­bly is dis­solved.

Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine has not an­nounced a date as yet, but his par­ty, the To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty, has start­ed its screen­ing process.