The lead­ers of the PNM and UNC were in their usu­al po­si­tions on Thurs­day: on op­po­site ends.

That was re­spec­tive­ly in Diego Mar­tin and Ari­ma, where their con­clud­ing state­ments hint­ed at their par­ties’ po­si­tion for Mon­day’s Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tion.

“No elec­tion’s ever been won with­out the vot­ers com­ing to the polls ... work hard, en­cour­age your neigh­bours and friends...,” Prime Min­is­ter Kei­th Row­ley urged.

“I”m ask­ing vot­ers not to sit this elec­tion out ... stand your ground,” UNC leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar ap­pealed.

More mes­sages come to­day when each side gath­ers near the two LG bat­tle­grounds they’re seek­ing: PNM at Ma­coya; UNC, in San Fer­nan­do.

Since the June 6th an­nounce­ment of the LG elec­tion, the 1,091,936 elec­torate el­i­gi­ble to vote at 2,140 polling sta­tions (in ap­prox­i­mate­ly 775 polling di­vi­sions) has seen a cam­paign car­ry­ing gen­er­al elec­tion tones.

Al­so dif­fer­ent to the 2019 LGE, when there were 139 elec­toral dis­tricts, there are now 141, plus 22 bound­ary changes. There are more con­test­ing en­ti­ties—10 par­ties and six in­de­pen­dents to the sev­en par­ties of 2019.

It’s a big­ger elec­torate than 2019, which was 1,079,976. More spe­cial elec­tors than 2019 - 13,284 now to 13,050 then. Whether dif­fer­ent fig­ures and fea­tures pro­duce a big­ger turnout than the 34.49 per cent of 2019 re­mains ahead.

The con­test in­volves PNM against UNC and oth­er op­po­nents in three- and four-way “fights” in 110 ar­eas UNC’s con­test­ing; and al­so PNM with NTA and oth­ers in 31 ar­eas. One five-way race is in Point Fortin. Two-way con­tests are on­ly be­tween PNM/UNC (46) and PNM/NTA (19.)

The PEP’s con­test­ing 50 ar­eas along­side PNM, NTA and oth­ers; Re­unit­ed Farm­ers, 11 Cen­tral ar­eas against UNC and oth­ers. PDP’s in 17 ar­eas.

The 105,894-mem­ber PNM has bat­tled on the de­fen­sive fol­low­ing the UNC/NTA/Jack Warn­er ac­com­mo­da­tion‘s of­fen­sive. Among fail­ures of the term, Row­ley’s con­ced­ed the PNM paid the price for los­ing touch with To­ba­go. Mon­day’s test will say how suc­cess­ful any re­con­nec­tion bid has been.

Fol­low­ing UNC’s ac­com­mo­da­tion, PNM’s cam­paign brought Row­ley clos­er to the pub­lic via “Con­ver­sa­tions with the PM”. How pot­hole re­pair (from PoS to Ben Lomond) as­sur­ances and door-open­er ini­tia­tives, as well as warn­ings on mat­ters, in­clud­ing li­on­i­sa­tion of crim­i­nal­i­ty, as­sists, lies ahead.

In a high stakes elec­tion with im­pli­ca­tions for gen­er­al elec­tion and amid dwin­dled po­lit­i­cal stocks since 2019, PNM’s San­do bat­tle al­so rests heav­i­ly on Faris Al-Rawi hold­ing triple re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and whose po­lit­i­cal fu­ture is en­twined with re­sults. He’s the San Fer­nan­do West MP, where cer­tain elec­toral ar­eas are threat­ened. He’s at­tempt­ed propul­sion of LG since be­com­ing Min­is­ter in 2022 – and he’s the PNM’s PRO.

If the elec­tion’s a ref­er­en­dum on PNM per­for­mance and its LG re­form of­fer­ings, views will al­so be aired on UNC’s. Per­sad-Bisses­sar (like Row­ley) has gone af­ter in­de­pen­dent in­sti­tu­tions and used in­flam­ma­to­ry lan­guage—but she’s court­ed vot­ers large­ly on gen­er­al elec­tion promise.

Be­yond NTA leader Gary Grif­fith’s is­sues with Row­ley, the re­venge dom­i­nance in the UNC’s cam­paign was clear in MP Roodal Mooni­lal’s Wednes­day com­ment in Cou­va, ”This is your time to get back at dem!”

The fa­mous/in­fa­mous rep­u­ta­tion of ex­tra­di­tion-em­bat­tled Warn­er, who ex­pand­ed UNC’s “face”, at­tract­ed ob­vi­ous at­ten­tion, though his state­ments in­di­cate his ILP sup­port­ers haven’t ac­cept­ed the arrange­ment.

The ac­com­mo­da­tion’s promise of Gov­ern­ment en­er­gised UNC’s es­ti­mat­ed 121,000 sup­port­ers to the ex­tent that Per­sad-Bisses­sar, at one meet­ing, re­marked on smelling vic­to­ry ahead, list­ing cor­po­ra­tions UNC will win. But her sub­se­quent “light em up” lob­by has been frowned on enough for her to ad­mit she’s be­ing con­demned for it and con­script­ing “gangs­ta” styling in­to cam­paign­ing. On Thurs­day, she didn’t end by list­ing how many cor­po­ra­tions UNC would win. Mon­day will de­ter­mine the out­come of “play­ing” with guns and whether peo­ple agree the an­swer to T&T’s crime and gun prob­lem is more guns—and elim­i­na­tion of the TTPS “mid­dle­man.”

De­spite all said, sig­nalled, threat­ened, yelled, and done in the last six weeks, how much ap­a­thy plays a role and whether the out­come’s 8-6, 9-5, 7-7 or oth­er­wise, it’s now down to who has the best elec­tion ma­chin­ery on Mon­day. When T&T will know what it’s won. Or lost.