Rad­hi­ca Sookraj

Fire­works lit up the night sky at 1 am to­day as Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar took to the stage to thank thou­sands of sup­port­ers for as­sist­ing the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship in se­cur­ing a vic­to­ry over the PNM. The crowds chant­ed "Kam­la" con­tin­u­ous­ly while the reg­gae and pop mu­sic blast­ed from the speak­er box­es. Af­ter the fire­works rock­et­ed, Per­sad-Bisses­sar vowed to give rep­re­sen­ta­tion to every­one in T&T, in­clud­ing those who had not vot­ed for the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship. She said: "I will not let you down. I thank you for your trust. I will walk the walk and see us through."

Per­sad-Bisses­sar: "I am ho­n­oured by your trust, so tonight I am say­ing as Prime Min­is­ter elect of a great re­pub­lic of T&T, I can­not be­gin to ex­press how much your words and sup­port meant. "This has brought so many peo­ple at my side so I want to sin­cere­ly thank all those who had faith in me. Those who gave ded­i­ca­tion and sup­port." She al­so paid trib­ute to her hus­band Dr Gre­go­ry Bisses­sar and her staff at her Siparia con­stituen­cy. She said: "I pledge tonight that I will nev­er stop pay­ing at­ten­tion to your needs and the lead­er­ship of the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship re­sponds to your voice. No one will be left out. No one will be left be­hind." She added: "We will all rise al­to­geth­er. I of­fer my hands to those who did not feel as­sured to give us their trust, but we will work hard to gain your trust and as a na­tion we will all rise."

She said she planned to con­sult with all the lead­ers of the Part­ner­ship so they could help her to chart a way for­ward. She al­so vowed the peo­ple of To­ba­go would be in­clud­ed and would no longer feel left out. She said the vic­to­ry of the UNC showed that T&T's de­mo­c­ra­t­ic process was still pre­served. Mean­while, Per­sad-Bisses­sar and Ch­agua­nas West MP Jack Warn­er paid trib­ute to Bas­deo Pan­day who cel­e­brat­ed his 77th birth­day to­day. Per­sad-Bisses­sar said: "Thanks for the years of ser­vice and ded­i­ca­tion, for cre­at­ing equal­i­ty and na­tion­al uni­ty." Warn­er urged sup­port­ers to help Per­sad-Bisses­sar to suc­ceed as Prime Min­is­ter. He said the vic­to­ry of the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship meant there would be no prop­er­ty tax and no es­tab­lish­ment of the Rev­enue Board.