The Con­gress of the Peo­ple (COP) has moved to dis­pel spec­u­la­tion re­gard­ing its in­volve­ment in a for­mal coali­tion with the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) and oth­er po­lit­i­cal groups. 

In­ter­im chair­man Lons­dale Williams, in a re­lease is­sued yes­ter­day, said no agree­ment has been fi­nalised, em­pha­sis­ing that dis­cus­sions were held but no al­liance has been for­malised.

“I am not aware of any such agree­ment be­ing signed or al­liance for­malised. What I am aware of is that a con­ver­sa­tion took place and noth­ing more,” Williams stat­ed. His re­marks fol­low height­ened po­lit­i­cal ac­tiv­i­ty as the UNC, led by Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, has be­gun ef­forts to unite small­er po­lit­i­cal par­ties and ma­jor trade unions to chal­lenge the rul­ing Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) in the next gen­er­al elec­tion.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­cent­ly met with rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Pro­gres­sive Em­pow­er­ment Par­ty (PEP), Move­ment for Na­tion­al De­vel­op­ment (MND), and the Joint Trade Union Move­ment (JTUM), as well as lead­ers from labour groups such as the Oil­field Work­ers’ Trade Union (OW­TU), Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion (PSA), and Fire Ser­vice As­so­ci­a­tion (FSA). 

Dur­ing the meet­ing, Per­sad-Bisses­sar ex­pressed con­fi­dence in the emerg­ing coali­tion, com­par­ing it favourably to the 2010 Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship.

JTUM leader An­cel Ro­get jus­ti­fied the trade union move­ment’s in­volve­ment, cit­ing the “wide­spread pub­lic suf­fer­ing” un­der the cur­rent ad­min­is­tra­tion. “We feel that the on­ly vi­able so­lu­tion is for all of us to come to­geth­er and part­ner in the in­ter­est of Trinidad and To­ba­go,” Ro­get said, af­firm­ing con­fi­dence in the UNC’s lead­er­ship.

Mean­while, COP rep­re­sen­ta­tives have tak­en a more cau­tious stance. Kirk Sin­nette, an­oth­er COP in­ter­im leader, ex­pressed open­ness to col­lab­o­ra­tion but stressed the im­por­tance of learn­ing from past mis­takes. “We all have learned from our past and ex­pect to come and do some­thing dif­fer­ent here to­day,” Sin­nette re­marked dur­ing the meet­ing last Thurs­day.

Williams, yes­ter­day, in his state­ment said the Con­gress of the Peo­ple is com­mit­ted to ad­her­ing to its con­sti­tu­tion­al prin­ci­ples and main­tain­ing trans­paren­cy with its mem­ber­ship and sup­port­ers.

“What we as­cribe to do with­in this or­gan­i­sa­tion must stand against the scruti­ny of our con­sti­tu­tion,” he said, adding that any fi­nal de­ci­sions would be com­mu­ni­cat­ed to the par­ty’s mem­ber­ship and the gen­er­al pub­lic.

Williams al­so ac­knowl­edged the par­ty’s pre­vi­ous short­com­ings and pledged a re­newed fo­cus on good gov­er­nance.

“An old say­ing that I have held dear­ly to my heart for sev­er­al decades is this, ‘A man has not learned any­thing un­less it has changed him.’”

The COP was once a key part­ner in the 2010 Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship coali­tion.

Ef­forts to reach Per­sad-Bisses­sar for com­ment proved fu­tile. Ques­tions sent to oth­er Op­po­si­tion mem­bers went unan­swered up to late yes­ter­day evening.