On the home stretch of a Gen­er­al Elec­tion that was called just un­der six weeks ago, the var­i­ous par­ties are mak­ing their fi­nal push to win over the un­de­cid­ed at ral­lies and mo­tor­cades to­day, as the short but in­tense cam­paign sea­son reach­es its cli­max.

It has been a high-en­er­gy race to con­trol T&T’s cor­ri­dors of pow­er and el­i­gi­ble vot­ers have had plen­ty of help in de­cid­ing where to place their votes, in­clud­ing al­most night­ly meet­ings, ra­dio and tele­vi­sion broad­casts, print and elec­tron­ic ads and so­cial me­dia posts.

One of the dis­tinc­tive fea­tures of this elec­tion has been the num­ber of in­flu­encers who have made their pres­ence felt, speak­ing out on the ma­jor po­lit­i­cal is­sues on their on­line plat­forms.

All these are healthy signs of democ­ra­cy in ac­tion, true demon­stra­tions of rule by the peo­ple and for the peo­ple.

The vast ma­jor­i­ty, not just a se­lect few, have the pow­er to de­cide on the com­po­si­tion of T&T’s next Par­lia­ment and will be able to demon­strate that pow­er by their par­tic­i­pa­tion in the process on Mon­day.

Democ­ra­cy is not flaw­less but un­like many oth­er sys­tems of gov­ern­ment, it pro­vides free­doms and choic­es to cit­i­zens, re­gard­less of their gen­der, re­li­gion, eth­nic­i­ty and so­cial class. All have the same rights and oblig­a­tions, with­out dis­tinc­tion. That is not a mat­ter to be treat­ed light­ly.

Even the el­i­gi­ble vot­ers who have al­ready de­cid­ed not to ex­er­cise their fran­chise on Mon­day are en­joy­ing a right that can’t be de­nied and mak­ing a choice that will in­flu­ence the out­come of the polls.

The po­lit­i­cal free­dom that is alive and well in this na­tion is al­so demon­strat­ed by the di­verse range of can­di­dates of­fer­ing to serve the peo­ple, in­clud­ing those vy­ing for the po­si­tion of prime min­is­ter. They are all rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the dif­fer­ent cul­tures, be­liefs and val­ues that re­side here.

On April 28, vot­ers’ choic­es go well be­yond po­lit­i­cal vet­er­an Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and Stu­art Young, who was el­e­vat­ed to the po­si­tion of Prime Min­is­ter just a few weeks ago. They will al­so de­cide on the type of rep­re­sen­ta­tion they will have at the con­stituen­cy lev­el, vot­ing for the peo­ple who will make cru­cial leg­isla­tive and pol­i­cy de­ci­sions over the next five years.

In the past few weeks of elec­tion­eer­ing, cit­i­zens have freely ex­pressed po­lit­i­cal pref­er­ences, switched al­le­giances from one par­ty to an­oth­er and, in the case of en­ter­tain­ers and oth­er pop­u­lar per­son­al­i­ties, pub­licly en­dorsed their choic­es for prime min­is­ter.

So far, on­ly a few in­ci­dents have marred that peace­ful com­pe­ti­tion be­tween par­ties with dif­fer­ent in­ter­ests and ideas.

How­ev­er, it is crit­i­cal­ly im­por­tant in the days ahead and fol­low­ing April 28 for re­spon­si­ble and law-abid­ing cit­i­zens to con­tin­ue to re­spect the right to choose and to dis­play tol­er­ance for dif­fer­ent po­lit­i­cal views.

Hard-earned de­mo­c­ra­t­ic rights can eas­i­ly be lost. The pow­er of a free and fair vote needs to be pro­tect­ed.

It is not a triv­ial mat­ter that in these fi­nal days of cam­paign­ing, the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) is on high alert be­cause of al­leged threats to dis­rupt the de­mo­c­ra­t­ic process.

Par­ty lead­ers and can­di­dates should al­so be on the alert and strong­ly con­demn any ac­tions that could de­prive vot­ers of their right to par­tic­i­pate in Mon­day’s polling ac­tiv­i­ties freely.

T&T will lose if our democ­ra­cy is dis­rupt­ed. Let the pow­er to choose re­main in the hands of the vot­ers.