Elec­tions in Guyana and Ja­maica ear­li­er this week kept in­cum­bent gov­ern­ments in pow­er—out­comes very dif­fer­ent from T&T’s Gen­er­al Elec­tion four months ago, when Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) swept aside the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment af­ter al­most a decade in of­fice.

Still, the re­sults in Guyana and Ja­maica of­fer clear lessons for this coun­try’s new po­lit­i­cal class as they nav­i­gate the next five years.

Guyana’s poll came in the mid­dle of a his­toric oil boom. An­nu­al rev­enues now top US$7.5 bil­lion, mak­ing the coun­try one of the fastest-grow­ing economies in the world. Pres­i­dent Ir­faan Ali’s Peo­ple’s Pro­gres­sive Par­ty/Civic re­tained pow­er af­ter a cam­paign built on in­vest­ment in in­fra­struc­ture, ed­u­ca­tion and pub­lic ser­vices.

But the emer­gence of We In­vest in Na­tion­hood, a po­lit­i­cal move­ment formed just months be­fore the vote by US-sanc­tioned bil­lion­aire Azrud­din Mo­hamed, was a warn­ing sign. Its ap­peal to young and mar­gin­alised vot­ers re­flect­ed deep frus­tra­tion over how oil wealth is be­ing shared. Guyana’s ex­pe­ri­ence shows that rapid growth is not enough. Po­lit­i­cal sta­bil­i­ty re­quires cit­i­zens to feel that ben­e­fits are dis­trib­uted fair­ly and trans­par­ent­ly.

In Ja­maica, Prime Min­is­ter An­drew Hol­ness se­cured a third term, win­ning 34 of 63 seats. His cam­paign leaned heav­i­ly on a 43 per cent drop in killings this year, cred­it­ed to firearm seizures and stronger se­cu­ri­ty op­er­a­tions.

The se­cu­ri­ty gains gave him po­lit­i­cal cap­i­tal. But the meth­ods raised con­cerns, with hu­man rights groups warn­ing about heavy-hand­ed polic­ing. Even more trou­bling was vot­er turnout: just 38.8 per cent, the low­est in mod­ern Ja­maican his­to­ry. The re­sult high­light­ed a dan­ger­ous ap­a­thy among the elec­torate. Ja­maica shows both the po­lit­i­cal pay­off of re­duc­ing crime and the risks of alien­at­ing cit­i­zens in the process.

Both elec­tions point to the same les­son: le­git­i­ma­cy is frag­ile and must be con­stant­ly re­newed. In Guyana, it came through de­vel­op­ment. In Ja­maica it was tied to se­cu­ri­ty.

In T&T, Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s April vic­to­ry was won on con­crete promis­es—high­er salaries, job cre­ation, pen­sion pro­tec­tion, re­open­ing the chil­dren’s hos­pi­tal and restor­ing lap­tops for stu­dents. They worked be­cause they met im­me­di­ate needs.

The ques­tion now is how those pledges are de­liv­ered. For the Gov­ern­ment, and for the Op­po­si­tion re­group­ing af­ter de­feat, the re­gion­al re­sults of­fer three ur­gent re­minders:

Re­source man­age­ment must be trans­par­ent. T&T has long de­pend­ed on oil and gas. Cit­i­zens must see rev­enues used fair­ly, with in­de­pen­dent over­sight to pre­vent sus­pi­cions of cor­rup­tion or po­lit­i­cal bias.

Crime fight­ing can­not come at any cost. Ja­maicans re­ward­ed Hol­ness for a drop in killings, but vot­er dis­il­lu­sion­ment was deep­ened by fears over rights abus­es. T&T’s lead­ers must bal­ance firm ac­tion against crime with due process and ac­count­abil­i­ty.

Democ­ra­cy needs re­new­al. Falling turnout is not unique to Ja­maica. Here too, few­er cit­i­zens are vot­ing. Un­less par­ties re­con­nect with young peo­ple, mar­gin­alised com­mu­ni­ties and the dis­en­chant­ed, fu­ture elec­tions risk the same hol­low le­git­i­ma­cy.

The wider mes­sage from the Caribbean is sober­ing. Oil wealth, eco­nom­ic pres­sure and pub­lic dis­trust can erode con­fi­dence quick­ly. For T&T’s new Gov­ern­ment, the re­al test be­gins now: turn­ing elec­toral vic­to­ry in­to last­ing trust, fair growth and stronger democ­ra­cy.

If that chal­lenge is not met, the sense of re­new­al that swept the UNC in­to of­fice could evap­o­rate long be­fore the next elec­tion.