STEPHON NICHOLAS

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

For­mer Mi­nor­i­ty Leader Kelvon Mor­ris will face ex-To­ba­go West MP Sham­fa Cud­joe for the lead­er­ship of the PNM To­ba­go Coun­cil.

Mor­ris an­nounced his can­di­da­cy dur­ing a Face­book Live ses­sion yes­ter­day, one week af­ter Cud­joe en­tered the race for the April 19 in­ter­nal elec­tions.

Wear­ing an or­ange PNM Dar­rel Spring/Whim jer­sey, Mor­ris said his ex­pe­ri­ence as the lone PNM as­sem­bly­man in the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) has pre­pared him for the role.

The PNM has strug­gled in To­ba­go elec­tions in re­cent years. In De­cem­ber 2021, the par­ty lost the THA elec­tions 14-1 to the Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots, with Mor­ris the sole suc­cess­ful can­di­date. The par­ty’s for­tunes wors­ened on Jan­u­ary 12, when it was shut out 15-0 by the To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty, mark­ing three con­sec­u­tive THA elec­tions with­out a win.

In his con­ces­sion speech, out­go­ing To­ba­go Coun­cil leader An­cil Den­nis an­nounced he would step aside for a new ex­ec­u­tive. Den­nis had pre­vi­ous­ly re­sist­ed calls to re­sign af­ter the PNM lost both To­ba­go seats in the April 2025 gen­er­al elec­tion.

Mor­ris said, “Over the last five years I have had the ho­n­our of car­ry­ing the torch of the PNM in the THA. Through un­wa­ver­ing ser­vice to the peo­ple of Dar­rel Spring/Whim and the wider To­ba­go com­mu­ni­ty, and as the lone elect­ed rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the PNM and Mi­nor­i­ty Leader, I car­ried the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of rep­re­sent­ing not on­ly my con­stituents but the proud lega­cy of our par­ty.”

He added: “Even when the road was dif­fi­cult, and the odds were not in our favour, I stood firm­ly for prin­ci­ples, val­ues and the peo­ple I rep­re­sent­ed. That ex­pe­ri­ence was not easy, but it strength­ened my re­solve, sharp­ened my lead­er­ship, and deep­ened my com­mit­ment to the peo­ple of To­ba­go and the fu­ture of the PNM.”

Mor­ris said his de­ci­sion to vie for lead­er­ship came af­ter care­ful re­flec­tion and dis­cus­sions with PNM faith­ful and sup­port­ers across the is­land. Echo­ing sen­ti­ments ex­pressed by Cud­joe, he said the PNM is at a cross­roads.

“The PNM in To­ba­go stands at a piv­otal mo­ment in its his­to­ry, one that calls for strong lead­er­ship to re­build trust with our sup­port­ers, re­con­nect with our com­mu­ni­ties, and in­spire a new gen­er­a­tion of To­bag­o­ni­ans,” he said.

He out­lined a vi­sion cen­tred on ser­vice, in­tegri­ty, dis­ci­pline, and de­vel­op­ment.

“My vi­sion is clear, and my man­date is clear­er. We must strength­en our par­ty or­gan­i­sa­tion, em­pow­er our mem­ber­ship, and en­sure that every par­ty group be­comes a vi­brant force for com­mu­ni­ty en­gage­ment and po­lit­i­cal mo­bil­i­sa­tion. We must lis­ten close­ly to the con­cerns of our peo­ple and present prac­ti­cal so­lu­tions that cre­ate op­por­tu­ni­ties for our youth, ex­pand our econ­o­my, and se­cure a stronger fu­ture for To­ba­go.”

Call­ing for a uni­fied ap­proach, Mor­ris em­pha­sised team­work, hon­est di­a­logue, and a re­newed com­mit­ment to putting peo­ple first.

“I firm­ly be­lieve that our best days are ahead of us, but reach­ing that fu­ture will re­quire courage. The PNM will once again stand as a strong and re­spect­ed voice for To­bag­o­ni­ans,” he said.

In an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, out­go­ing Den­nis de­clined to en­dorse a can­di­date for his suc­ces­sor.

“I will not in­di­cate pub­licly who I will sup­port, but I do in­tend to vote for one of the op­tions,” he said.

Asked whether the par­ty could with­stand a po­ten­tial­ly bit­ter lead­er­ship bat­tle sim­i­lar to the 2020 in­ter­nal elec­tions, Mor­ris said, “One-man, one-vote is ob­vi­ous­ly the most de­mo­c­ra­t­ic way to elect a new leader. It’s re­al­ly about how we con­duct our­selves. As long as we con­duct our­selves in a dis­ci­plined and sen­si­ble way, we shouldn’t have any chal­lenges at all.”

Re­flect­ing on his tenure, Den­nis, elect­ed un­op­posed in 2022, said he did not have the sup­port of sev­er­al key fig­ures in the par­ty but has no re­grets.

“When we lost that elec­tion in 2021, I of­fered my­self to take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for the first leg of the re­build. Here ends the first leg. The jour­ney will con­tin­ue un­der new lead­er­ship. I be­lieve in the re­silience of this par­ty called the PNM and look for­ward to con­tin­ued con­tri­bu­tion as a mem­ber of the PNM,” he said.

The PNM will be seek­ing its fourth To­ba­go Coun­cil leader in six years. Ef­forts to con­tact Cud­joe were un­suc­cess­ful.