DA­REECE PO­LO

Se­nior Re­porter

da­reece.po­lo@guardian.co.tt

From the up­scale gat­ed com­mu­ni­ties of the hills to the mid­dle-class and low­er-class struc­tures of the val­leys, St Joseph, the for­mer cap­i­tal of T&T, is dis­tinct in its make-up of res­i­dents in com­par­i­son to the oth­er 40 con­stituen­cies across the coun­try.

While Guardian Me­dia could not reach res­i­dents in the af­flu­ent ar­eas, some in the low­er to mid­dle-class ar­eas were up­beat af­ter Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA) leader Gary Grif­fith de­clared his in­ten­tion to run for MP in the next gen­er­al elec­tion.

The Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment’s Ter­rence Deyals­ingh is the in­cum­bent.

Among them was Adri­an Williams, who told Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day he be­lieves Grif­fith’s tenure as com­mis­sion­er of po­lice should serve as a yard­stick for his per­for­mance.

“He showed in­tegri­ty. He showed that he’s hon­est. When it comes to crime, he’s a no-non­sense man, so it could be a good thing,” Williams said.

Paul Chan­ic­ka, who not­ed he moved out of St Joseph five years ago, said he was born and raised in the con­stituen­cy. He de­clared that he would cast his vote for Grif­fith.

“I will go for Gary be­cause he’s maybe one of the more hon­est politi­cians we have right now. You can’t con­sid­er Row­ley or Kam­la. No way in hell I vot­ing for them or their par­ty.”

Res­i­dent Noel Har­ry de­tailed is­sues the com­mu­ni­ty con­tin­ues to face, in­clud­ing a lack of in­fra­struc­tur­al re­pairs, un­em­ploy­ment, drainage works, and oth­er chal­lenges. He be­lieves Grif­fith could help.

“You see the kind of work he do in the po­lice force, yuh know he don’t play. He will come to help the peo­ple, and he will give we a bet­ter re­sponse ... The PNM? Promis­es ... prob­lems!”

How­ev­er, Hei­di Cros­by was scep­ti­cal that he would make an im­pact.

“Is he re­al­ly go­ing to do any­thing for us? Has any politi­cian done any­thing for us?”

Oth­er con­cerns flagged were crime, poor roads, a need for more street­lights, and a call for the in­stal­la­tion of CCTV cam­eras.

Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day on Grif­fith's move to con­test the seat, UNC deputy po­lit­i­cal leader David Lee said the NTA was an in­de­pen­dent par­ty. He said the NTA’s al­liance with the UNC in lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tions may or may not be re­peat­ed.

“Who can say down the road that there is some ... on­ly the Lord knows what will hap­pen down the road, so I will not rule out any­thing.”

The UNC’s dead­line for fil­ing nom­i­na­tions for all 41 con­stituen­cies will end on April 11. The gen­er­al elec­tion is con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly due next year.

On Mon­day, MP Ter­rence Deyals­ingh, who has held the seat for close to a decade, said he was un­fazed by the “shenani­gans” of both Grif­fith and Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

An­a­lysts speak

Prof Hamid Ghany la­belling Grif­fith’s de­ci­sion “an as­tute po­lit­i­cal move,” said, “It’s not to say he went in­to a seat that the UNC cur­rent­ly holds and de­clared his can­di­da­cy. He went in­to a seat that they do not cur­rent­ly hold, so there’s no step­ping on toes or mash­ing of corns, as the case might be, so the dis­cus­sions will con­tin­ue. But he’s sig­nalling that he’s se­ri­ous that he’s in­tend­ing to con­test, and he’s served no­tice that he’s do­ing so.”

But po­lit­i­cal sci­en­tist Dr In­di­ra Ram­per­sad dis­agrees with this, say­ing the an­nounce­ment was pre­ma­ture.

“If there’s an ac­com­mo­da­tion, he’s forc­ing the UNC’s hand to have him fight that seat on an NTA tick­et so that the UNC doesn’t con­test. On the oth­er hand, if there’s no ac­com­mo­da­tion, this move that he’s done could anger the UNC and its leader. In that he’s pre­empt­ing any call for an ac­com­mo­da­tion with­out prop­er dis­cus­sions by uni­lat­er­al­ly de­clar­ing him­self the can­di­date for the seat.”