They were prime movers in the UNC but for­mer UNC Cu­mu­to-Man­zanil­la MP Collin Par­tap start­ed work­ing with PNM's Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment cam­paign two weeks ago, while ex-UNC Ma­yaro MP Win­ston "Gyp­sy" Pe­ters is be­ing wooed by the PNM to take Ma­yaro in the gen­er­al polls.

Both spoke to the Guardian be­tween Fri­day and Sat­ur­day.

Spec­u­la­tion has been mount­ing about Pe­ters and PNM's gen­er­al elec­tion thrust since he was ap­point­ed Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion (NCC) chair­man in April 2018. He threw more light on the sit­u­a­tion last Fri­day. (see box)

To­mor­row's Bud­get de­liv­ery for the fi­nal year of the term and de­bate of an Elec­tion and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion or­der to fa­cil­i­tate bound­ary shifts and oth­er changes need­ed for Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment polls will in­for­mal­ly sig­nal the start of the elec­tion year. Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment polls are ex­pect­ed af­ter No­vem­ber 28 when the LG term ends. PN­Mites spec­u­late elec­tions may be in ear­ly De­cem­ber.

The PNM fi­nalised out­stand­ing LG can­di­dates last Fri­day and will be­gin screen­ing for four more gen­er­al elec­tion ar­eas af­ter the Bud­get de­bate. PNM al­ready has gen­er­al elec­tion can­di­dates for Pointe-a-Pierre (Daniel Dook­ie), San Juan/Barataria (Ndale Young) and Ch­agua­nas East (Clarence Ramb­harat). UNC has com­plet­ed LG can­di­dates and will close gen­er­al elec­tion nom­i­na­tions for 21 PNM-held seats on Oc­to­ber 24.

Par­tap, 46, aired his dis­en­chant­ment with the UNC in a May Sun­day Guardian sto­ry where he was mum on be­com­ing PNM's gen­er­al elec­tion can­di­date for Cu­mu­to-Man­zanil­la. But last Wednes­day, Par­tap showed up in com­pa­ny with the Prime Min­is­ter and oth­er gov­ern­ment min­is­ters for crick­et at the Queen's Park Oval. In the VIP box with them was for­mer PP min­is­ter Em­manuel George.

George, the broth­er of HDC chair­man New­man George, says, "I just went to watch crick­et and I watched crick­et. That's all. I have no po­lit­i­cal am­bi­tions re­gard­ing PNM. I go every year to watch crick­et in the Oval with all kinds of peo­ple, you'd have seen I wasn't talk­ing to a lot of peo­ple. I was fo­cused on the game."

Par­tap, how­ev­er, con­firmed he has been in­volved with PNM for over a year, though silent on who re­cruit­ed him. Since last month he has been help­ing PNM co-or­di­nate ar­eas in his for­mer con­stituen­cy which are un­der the San­gre Grande cor­po­ra­tion. Yes­ter­day he was at meet­ings in Cu­mu­to-Tamana.

With the PP Gov­ern­ment, Par­tap was fired in 2012 as a min­is­ter in the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­istry af­ter re­fus­ing to do a breath test. He was charged with Dri­ving Un­der the In­flu­ence in 2013 and fined, re­main­ing a back­bencher for the rest of the PP's term.

Par­tap is one of sev­er­al "work­ing" on the grounds in Grande, a key mar­gin­al cor­po­ra­tion where PNM and UNC tied in the 2016 polls. PNM ex­ec­u­tive mem­ber In­dar Paras­ram is co-or­di­na­tor, but for­mer To­co MP Roger Boynes is al­so in­volved. Boynes, resur­fac­ing in PNM a few months ago, fo­cus­es on Man­zanil­la work­ing via vil­lage coun­cils to "train" res­i­dents how to ben­e­fit from gov­ern­ment in­fra­struc­ture. Boynes said he was "com­plete­ly closed" to be­ing To­co's gen­er­al elec­tion can­di­date.

Par­tap, mean­while, re­mains silent on whether he will be­come PNM's Cu­mu­to-Man­zanil­la gen­er­al elec­tion can­di­date. He has not filled out a PNM mem­ber­ship form yet, but he said he will at some point be­cause he has made a "val­ues-based de­ci­sion" stand­ing against cor­rup­tion, pover­ty and crime.

"My mind's made up on help­ing them for lo­cal polls but I don't want to rush in­to elect­ed pol­i­tics and all that dra­ma—let's see what hap­pens ahead. I want PNM to win lo­cal elec­tions and San­gre Grande. PNM's at the fore­front of the fight against cor­rup­tion and who­ev­er fights cor­rup­tion I'll be on their side."

Par­tap said his fa­ther, Har­ry—whom he suc­ceed­ed as MP—sup­ports him, "He sup­ports any par­ty fight­ing cor­rup­tion. He had sent let­ters to the ed­i­tor call­ing on UNC's leader to re­move Ma­yaro cor­po­ra­tion chair­man Glen Ram when he was charged, but noth­ing was done. We were both dis­ap­point­ed when (Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar) didn't do the ho­n­ourable thing, re­move Ram and tack­le al­leged cor­rup­tion. The Con­sti­tu­tion says you're in­no­cent un­til proven guilty, but it's not ac­cept­able to be in charge of pub­lic mon­ey with a charge like that over­head."

Par­tap was loud in praise of PM Kei­th Row­ley, "He's ded­i­cat­ed to fight­ing cor­rup­tion and putting T&T back on track. When he took of­fice he faced low oil prices, mount­ing pub­lic de­bate and oth­er prob­lems. So far he's dealt with the is­sues in­clud­ing crime, putting Gary (Grif­fith) as Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er. He'd done what he has to do—what was right for the last four years. That's the kind of leader I'd like to sup­port."

By con­trast, he said UNC was in "a tail­spin." UNC deputy leader Kadi­jah Ameen—whom UNC of­fi­cials hint is "work­ing" the Cu­mu­to ar­eas—didn't an­swer calls yes­ter­day.

BOX

Gyp­sy wooed by PNM for Ma­yaro

His name is be­ing heard the loud­est among pos­si­ble PNM can­di­dates for Ma­yaro for gen­er­al elec­tions—and for­mer UNC Ma­yaro MP Win­ston "Gyp­sy" Pe­ters isn't closed to ap­proach­es.

Pe­ters was UNC's Ma­yaro MP from 2007 to 2015 but wasn't picked for the 2015 polls. Ma­yaro is cur­rent­ly held by UNC's Rush­ton Paray, a for­mer PNM mem­ber.

PNM of­fi­cials said an­oth­er per­son tipped for the area is a Ma­yaro busi­ness­man who had worked with the PNM's 2015 cam­paign. But Pe­ters is so far a fron­trun­ner. Con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cials con­firmed he has been ap­proached by mem­bers.

Pe­ters, 66, said he still thinks of Ma­yaro as his turf. "I'm a politi­cian and a ca­lyp­son­ian by pro­fes­sion which al­so makes me a born politi­cian. I don't know about run­ning for of­fice, but I'm not fin­ished with pol­i­tics.

"We're all politi­cians to some de­gree. So, I'm open to any ap­proach­es. I'm not closed to any ap­proach­es (to con­test), I'm open to any­thing that will help my coun­try."

UNC's Paray (like Par­tap) had un­suc­cess­ful­ly re­quest­ed UNC re­move Ram. He didn't an­swer calls.