Michelle Loubon

Ca­lyp­son­ian Win­ston Scar­bor­ough (De Orig­i­nal De Fos­to Him­self) says Ah Cyah Vote For Dat is an­oth­er song from his reper­toire of pa­tri­ot­ic songs.

In a tele­vi­sion in­ter­view with CNC3 pre­sen­ter Pao­lo Ker­na­han, he felt he had to re­flect the griev­ances of the peo­ple and give voice to the dis­pos­sessed. Scar­bor­ough said: "I spoke about the song and how the de­ci­sions Prime Min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning were af­fect­ing the dis­pos­sessed in the so­ci­ety. "I no­ticed when you look around, poor peo­ple are left hun­gry and in need," he said. "I had to ask my­self about the smelter, and the no-con­fi­dence mo­tion. How could I vote for that? I looked at how the peo­ple in Ari­ma want­ed Pen­ne­lope Beck­les and they were giv­en Lau­rel Leza­ma. I had to con­clude Ah Cyah Vote for Dat."

Scar­bor­ough be­gan the in­ter­view with his Re­flec­tions on the late Dr Er­ic Williams, the first prime min­is­ter of T&T. "The late Dr Er­ic Williams made a great con­tri­bu­tion and I paid trib­ute to Dr Er­ic Williams for his work," he said. "I sang Re­flec­tions of the late Prime Min­is­ter (who died on March 29, 1981)." He spoke about oth­er pa­tri­ot­ic songs that he had com­posed, in­clud­ing O Trinidad and From Colo­nial­ism To Re­pub­li­can­ism. "I am re­flect­ing the needs in the so­ci­ety," Scar­bor­ough said.

"If you have fol­lowed me his­tor­i­cal­ly, you would see I sang songs about Vin­dra Naipaul and Po­lice Mon­ey...I am re­flect­ing the needs of the so­ci­ety." Scar­bor­ough has per­formed Ah Cyah Vote For Dat on the UNC plat­forms at St Au­gus­tine, St He­le­na and is ex­pect­ed to per­form in Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad Bisses­sar's Siparia con­stituen­cy tonight. De­fend­ing his de­ci­sion to sing with the UNC, he said: "I wrote the tune be­cause of the is­sues. The par­ty saw the need for the song. They saw the prob­lems the song had high­light­ed."

He had an­oth­er mes­sage for his crit­ics. "Isn't UNC part of the so­ci­ety? Aren't those politi­cians part of our so­ci­ety? The UNC is part of the de­mo­c­ra­t­ic process," Scar­bor­ough said.