Akash Sama­roo

Po­lit­i­cal an­a­lysts be­lieve Anil Roberts was over­looked by the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) for the mar­gin­al St Joseph seat be­cause of his ques­tion­able po­lit­i­cal past.

At­tor­ney De­vesh Ma­haraj has in­stead been giv­en the nod and an­a­lysts sug­gest this is be­cause he does not have the “bag­gage” that Roberts would have brought to the seat that the UNC lost in 2020 by on­ly 811 votes.

Roberts, how­ev­er, yes­ter­day told Guardian Me­dia that he holds no ill will to­wards his par­ty and has pledged to help Ma­haraj beat the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment’s choice of in­cum­bent MP Ter­rence Deyals­ingh.

Roberts rep­re­sents the UNC in the Sen­ate but ac­cord­ing to an­a­lyst Dr In­dera Sage­wan he would have been a li­a­bil­i­ty in the 2025 gen­er­al elec­tions.

“Anil does come with a cer­tain lev­el of bag­gage and even though he has served in Sen­ate and while many thought he would have had a sure foot in, I feel that the par­ty, its hi­er­ar­chy and its lead­er­ship un­der­stand that in this mo­ment, it re­quires a dif­fer­ent ap­proach, it re­quires per­sons who of­fer greater sta­bil­i­ty and a greater sense of depth as it comes to com­pe­tence.”

Mean­while, Sage­wan be­lieves Ma­haraj, who fea­tured promi­nent­ly as a le­gal ex­pert at the UNC’s Town Hall meet­ing in Barataria in No­vem­ber, has the po­ten­tial to en­er­gise the en­tire par­ty.

“I think De­vesh is a very, very strong can­di­date for the par­ty be­cause al­though he does not have “silk,” he is a le­gal lu­mi­nary. He has rep­re­sent­ed and served many high-lev­el of­fi­cials in this coun­try. His rep­u­ta­tion pre­cedes him as a very sol­id at­tor­ney-at-law. I know he has a deep com­mit­ment to com­mu­ni­ty, re­flect­ed by the pro­grammes he’s in­volved in, for ex­am­ple feed­ing the home­less in Port-of-Spain, so he has that kind of com­mu­ni­ty ground­ing.”

She added, “I al­so know he’s a spir­i­tu­al per­son, so these are things that auger well and from a na­tion­al per­spec­tive, peo­ple see­ing a can­di­date like De­vesh will strength­en the cred­i­bil­i­ty of the UNC at this point in time in terms of what it is of­fer­ing for gov­er­nance.”

Like­wise, fel­low an­a­lyst Dr Shane Mo­hammed told Guardian Me­dia that un­like Roberts, Ma­haraj has the ca­pac­i­ty to wres­tle away the seat from the PNM.

“I be­lieve that there are po­lit­i­cal ac­tors, by their work eth­ic and pos­i­tive im­pact, who pos­sess the abil­i­ty to tra­verse the po­lit­i­cal land­scape like Pen­ny (Beck­les), Amery (Browne) and Camille (Robin­son-Reg­is) in the PNM and like Vas­ant (Bharath), Roodal (Mooni­lal) and Fuad (Khan) in the UNC,” Mo­hammed said.

“Anil Roberts is not one of those. De­vesh rep­re­sents a can­di­date who has the ca­pac­i­ty to win with­out is­sue of bag­gage - he just needs to up his charis­ma and be re­lat­able in the im­por­tant ar­eas like the hills and Bangladesh amongst oth­ers.”

How­ev­er, Mo­hammed said he is yet to see any UNC can­di­date with the x-fac­tor to get the pop­u­la­tion be­hind Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s par­ty.

“There is still a need for can­di­dates that bring the wow fac­tors to ex­cite the pop­u­la­tion. Young, bright, head­lin­ers are still im­por­tant to the whole. How­ev­er, UNC’s over-con­fi­dence - con­fi­dence is their biggest weak­ness.”

Roberts was the sub­ject of a probe by the Po­lice Ser­vice in­to the con­tro­ver­sial Life Sport pro­gramme he cre­at­ed in 2012 un­der the Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship (PP) ad­min­is­tra­tion. Roberts has since de­nied any wrong­do­ing. As of Au­gust 2024, it still re­mains an ac­tive po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

Roberts ten­dered his res­ig­na­tion to then-prime min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar in Ju­ly, 2014.

But yes­ter­day, Roberts said he has gra­cious­ly ac­cept­ed the de­ci­sion of his par­ty’s screen­ing com­mit­tee.

He too be­lieves Ma­haraj is an ex­cel­lent choice.

“I am nev­er one to be in pol­i­tics about my­self, my goals or what I want, I am there for coun­try and for team. So, I am not dis­ap­point­ed at all. I of­fered my­self, the team, and the lead­er­ship de­ter­mined to go in a di­rec­tion that would bring vic­to­ry. I am there to sup­port Mr Ma­haraj, I con­grat­u­lat­ed him and I am meet­ing with him this evening, hand­ing over the team, and the work we have done, co­or­di­nat­ing and prepar­ing St Joseph for vic­to­ry for the UNC,” Roberts said.

The for­mer sports min­is­ter said he views the po­lit­i­cal par­ty like a foot­ball team.

“We must move away from the pol­i­tics of self­ish­ness to­wards the pol­i­tics of self­less­ness. In a foot­ball team, you do what the coach says, you may be a star strik­er but in one game they may need you to de­fend, go in the goal, sit on the bench or even bring wa­ter. That’s how I have been built and that’s who I am,” he added.

So far, the UNC has cho­sen eight can­di­dates for the next gen­er­al elec­tion.

They are Sad­dam Ho­sein (Barataria/San Juan), Van­dana Mo­hit (Ch­agua­nas East), Dr Michael Dowlat (San Fer­nan­do West), John Michael Al­i­bo­cas (San Fer­nan­do East), Dr Na­tal­ie Chai­tan-Ma­haraj (Lopinot/Bon Air West), Richard Smith (Arou­ca/Mal­oney), De­vesh Ma­haraj (St Joseph) and Wayne Sturge (To­co/San­gre Grande).