Find­ing the log­ic be­hind de­ci­sions made by politi­cians re­lat­ing to the de­ter­mi­na­tion of the elec­tion date is akin to Bas­deo Pan­day’s dic­tum that “pol­i­tics has a moral­i­ty of its own.” That left be­hind, the ex­pec­ta­tion must now be that the elec­torate will have to adopt far more con­ven­tion­al log­ic to elect­ing a par­ty and even­tu­al­ly a gov­ern­ment to suc­cess­ful­ly han­dle the af­fairs of the coun­try for the next five years.

It has been said of every elec­tion of the last 25 years that each one has been the most crit­i­cal; this one ranks amongst them.

Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young lead­ing the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) in­to the cam­paign is of un­tried ca­pac­i­ty. There must, there­fore, be ques­tions about Young’s gen­er­al­ship of a suc­cess­ful cam­paign. If his par­ty were to pull off an elec­tion vic­to­ry, it’s like­ly to be a nar­row one, which can leave it with­out too much wrig­gle room in terms of be­ing able to gov­ern the coun­try, es­pe­cial­ly where leg­isla­tive ac­tion will be re­quired, go­ing for­ward. So, too, will Young be a novice in the job as prime min­is­ter and this is notwith­stand­ing the few short stints he had when act­ing for his pre­de­ces­sor, Dr Kei­th Row­ley.

Amongst Young’s tasks, if the PNM is elect­ed to of­fice and if he is cho­sen as prime min­is­ter and even­tu­al­ly par­ty leader, will be to take on the almighty chal­lenge of trans­form­ing an econ­o­my that con­tin­ues to be de­pen­dent on the geopol­i­tics of en­er­gy and the buf­fet­ing of fluc­tu­at­ing in­ter­na­tion­al prices and po­lit­i­cal de­ci­sion-mak­ing. 

An­oth­er key is­sue will be whether Young can be­gin dis­man­tling Trinidad and To­ba­go’s el­e­ment of the in­ter­na­tion­al crim­i­nal gang cul­ture which holds this coun­try in its grip and has cre­at­ed ter­ror amongst cit­i­zens.

In Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, there is ex­pe­ri­ence as prime min­is­ter; but in her one term as prime min­is­ter, Mrs Per­sad-Bisses­sar failed to hold to­geth­er a po­lit­i­cal al­liance. In the present, she not on­ly has a frag­ile coali­tion, but there are in­di­ca­tions of in­sta­bil­i­ty with­in her par­ty.

As has hap­pened in the past, such al­liances of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) and oth­er par­ties have proven to be un­work­able over the long term, both in gov­ern­ment and op­po­si­tion. Noth­ing Per­sad-Bisses­sar has done or said this time around in­di­cates any­thing new.

Re­gard­ing Young’s ex­pe­ri­ence in gov­ern­ment, he has held crit­i­cal po­si­tions in the present and past ad­min­is­tra­tions, among them Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty and En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries. As is com­mon knowl­edge, the prospects for eco­nom­ic growth de­pend heav­i­ly on what the US gov­ern­ment, led by a most un­pre­dictable and volatile Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump, de­cides, which leaves the Drag­on gas deal be­tween T&T and Venezuela in a pre­car­i­ous po­si­tion.

In his stint as Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty, Young failed, like all oth­ers be­fore and af­ter him on both sides of the po­lit­i­cal di­vide, to wrench the coun­try away from the gangs and car­tels which fi­nance, man­age and pro­tect the in­ter­na­tion­al trade in drugs and guns. 

The task, there­fore, of se­lect­ing a par­ty and leader with known and demon­strat­ed ca­pac­i­ty to face the ma­jor chal­lenges of this and fu­ture gen­er­a­tions, is one which re­quires the elec­torate to scale the walls of trib­al and fa­nat­i­cal par­ty loy­al­ty.