Ken Ali

Trade union­ists Er­rol McLeod and David Ab­du­lah are like­ly to con­test the May 24 gen­er­al elec­tion on joint op­po­si­tion "uni­ty" tick­ets. And vet­er­an po­lit­i­cal and so­cial ac­tivist Makan­dal Daa­ga is ex­pect­ed to line up in one of the Laven­tille con­stituen­cies. In ad­di­tion, Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) is now slat­ed to con­test 24 seats, more than ear­li­er des­ig­nat­ed. Fur­ther, dis­cus­sions were on­go­ing on whether there would be a sin­gle bal­lot box sym­bol. These are the ma­jor de­vel­op­ments aris­ing from a late night meet­ing Sat­ur­day among the ma­jor op­po­si­tion po­lit­i­cal play­ers. In­formed sources said McLeod and Ab­du­lah were like­ly to be can­di­dates of Move­ment for So­cial Jus­tice (MSJ), one of the or­gan­i­sa­tions in the uni­ty pact.

McLeod, a for­mer long-serv­ing leader of Oil­fields Work­ers' Trade Union (OW­TU), rep­re­sent­ed Oropouche from 1976 to 1981, af­ter be­ing elect­ed on a Unit­ed Labour Front (ULF) tick­et. Ab­du­lah un­suc­cess­ful­ly con­test­ed that elec­tion, al­so as a ULF can­di­date. He is an OW­TU of­fi­cial. The UNC top brass, head­ed by leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, on Sat­ur­day sealed elec­toral deals with MSJ and Daa­ga's Na­tion­al Joint Ac­tion Com­mit­tee (NJAC). Daa­ga and NJAC were ma­jor ar­chi­tects of the 1970 Black Pow­er protests. The UNC had on Fri­day struck an ac­cord with Con­gress of the Peo­ple (COP). There were still in­di­ca­tions yes­ter­day that COP leader Win­ston Dook­er­an had not yet de­cid­ed on whether to face the polls.

Apart from Dook­er­an's can­di­da­cy, de­ci­sions have been tak­en on most rep­re­sen­ta­tives of UNC, COP, MSJ, NJAC and To­ba­go Or­gan­i­sa­tion of the Peo­ple (TOP). TOP leader Ash­worth Jack said his par­ty would de­cide to­day on can­di­dates for To­ba­go East and To­ba­go West. While there was con­sen­sus on the St Au­gus­tine seat, there has re­port­ed­ly not yet been a fi­nal de­ci­sion on the choice of can­di­date. Sources said the can­di­date may not come from the as­pi­rants who faced the screen­ing ex­er­cise. Per­sad-Bisses­sar is said to be hold­ing tough to her po­si­tion that she would not ap­point any­one who did not sup­port her ear­li­er bid to be named Op­po­si­tion Leader.

She was ap­point­ed Op­po­si­tion Leader on Feb­ru­ary 24, af­ter eight of the then 15 Op­po­si­tion MPs signed a let­ter to Pres­i­dent George Maxwell Richards pledg­ing sup­port. If Per­sad-Bisses­sar con­tin­ues to hold to her po­si­tion, it could see the sidelin­ing of St Au­gus­tine in­cum­bent Vas­ant Bharath, Tabaquite's Ramesh Lawrence Ma­haraj, Mikela Pan­day of Oropouche West, Sub­has Pan­day of Princes Town South, and Kelvin Ram­nath of Cou­va South. In ad­di­tion, at least one of the eight MPs who signed the doc­u­ment is not ex­pect­ed to be re­tained. T&T Guardian re­port­ed ear­li­er that UNC would con­test the li­on's share of the 41 seats.