Deputy leader of the Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) Wat­son Duke will not part­ner with the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) to chal­lenge the Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) in any of the Trinidad elec­tions.

On Fri­day he said that the PDP will con­test every elec­tion in Trinidad.

A con­fi­dent Duke told the Sun­day Guardian that the lo­cal gov­ern­ment fight would be be­tween "two win­ners"–the PNM and the PDP, which could leave the UNC as the third con­tender.

"Let's face it, there are two ex­ec­u­tives right now in the coun­try, one is head­ed by the PNM in Trinidad and the oth­er by the PDP in To­ba­go. The UNC does not fea­ture there. They are the Op­po­si­tion, they are not an ex­ec­u­tive, so it's re­al­ly a case where a small To­ba­go ex­ec­u­tive led by the PDP is about to chal­lenge the Trinidad ex­ec­u­tive led by the PNM," Duke said in a tele­phone in­ter­view on Fri­day.

"It is one ex­ec­u­tive against the next, the UNC does not fea­ture," he said.

Duke said that the PDP "makes laws and has mon­ey to spend."

"We ac­tu­al­ly fix things, not the UNC, they do not fea­ture in this," Duke said.

"This is a fi­nal count­down."

Duke is open­ing Trinidad's first PDP of­fice in Barataria to­day.

The PDP won 14 of the 15 seats at Jan­u­ary's To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) elec­tions, caus­ing a 20-year up­set for the PNM. In the past week, Duke has post­ed up­dates to so­cial me­dia show­ing the state of the mar­ket and meet­ing with peo­ple on the streets of Port-of-Spain.

His­tor­i­cal­ly, Trinidad pol­i­tics have swung be­tween two par­ties, a third par­ty rarely makes a sig­nif­i­cant im­pact (See Prof Hamid Ghany on page 19). On Fri­day, Duke dis­missed the UNC as the third par­ty.

"We are prepar­ing for every­thing right now, every­thing," he said about the up­com­ing elec­tions con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly due at the end of the year.

Dur­ing the THA elec­tions, the PNM ac­cused the PDP of be­ing an arm of the UNC and do­ing their bid­ding in To­ba­go.

"Look at To­ba­go's re­sults. To­ba­go re­sults clear­ly show that such id­i­ot­ic and crazy chants by the PNM re­sult­ed in their de­feat. If that made any kin­da sense, it would have made sense to the peo­ple of To­ba­go," Duke said.

Duke said that the PNM was served a "black­out" in To­ba­go.

"Let's see if that rhetoric works in Trinidad, let us see if it takes root in Trinidad where UNC would be chal­lenged by the PDP," he said.

Grif­fith to es­tab­lish a new po­lit­i­cal ve­hi­cle

Like­wise, for­mer com­mis­sion­er of po­lice Gary Grif­fith has sig­nalled his in­ten­tion to re­join pol­i­tics but he too is not look­ing to join an ex­ist­ing par­ty.

"Plen­ty talk is go­ing around. What is a fact is that this present Gov­ern­ment has been es­cort­ed to the de­par­ture door due to poor lead­er­ship and dic­ta­tor­ship. It is not if, it is when and by how much," Grif­fith said.

"I have been en­gaged in nu­mer­ous con­ver­sa­tions with cit­i­zens through­out the coun­try. Based on this, my di­rec­tion has been made. It is not to join a present par­ty but to es­tab­lish a new po­lit­i­cal ve­hi­cle to trans­form our coun­try," he said.

"I al­ways be­lieve that the rea­son for form­ing a po­lit­i­cal ve­hi­cle is to bat­tle in any na­tion­al elec­tion. Fail­ure to do this makes you an ac­tivist group. We have enough of these. We need a po­lit­i­cal ve­hi­cle to en­sure Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion. To­ba­go stood up and ex­pressed its dis­ap­point­ment with the poor lead­er­ship and dic­ta­tor­ship they ex­pe­ri­enced. Trinidad is no dif­fer­ent. There is no de­sire for bul­lies to dic­tate. Our cit­i­zens need lead­ers will­ing to serve. That can on­ly be achieved via par­tic­i­pat­ing in elec­tions," he said.

Alexan­der: PDP's en­try in­to Trinidad pol­i­tics is much too soon

So­cial me­dia ac­tivist, Phillip Alexan­der al­so weighed in on the PDP's en­try in­to lo­cal pol­i­tics. Alexan­der had launched the Pro­gres­sive Em­pow­er­ment Par­ty and con­test­ed the 2020 elec­tion but did not se­cure a seat.

"The en­try of the PDP in­to Trinidad pol­i­tics is much too soon," Alexan­der said.

He warned that Duke was not the "same per­son in Trinidad that he was in To­ba­go."

"I think he is tak­ing a chain-up and he is risk­ing los­ing To­ba­go by over­play­ing his hand in Trinidad. What the PDP won in To­ba­go is the equiv­a­lent to a con­stituen­cy in a na­tion­al elec­tion and to fight in an en­vi­ron­ment as hy­per-po­lit­i­cal as Trinidad is, as racial­ly di­vid­ed as Trinidad is, To­ba­go is mono-cul­tur­al, Trinidad is not," Alexan­der said.

Guardian Me­dia al­so con­tact­ed the leader of the Move­ment for So­cial Jus­tice, David Ab­du­lah but he said he was in a meet­ing and could not com­ment.

Guardian Me­dia al­so reached out to the Con­gress of the Peo­ple but there was no re­sponse.

Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley

PM Row­ley: What does that have to do with me?

Mean­while, Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley is un­both­ered by the new po­lit­i­cal play­ers.

The Prime Min­is­ter said that ad­di­tion­al par­ties jump­ing in­to the po­lit­i­cal are­na had noth­ing to do with him.

The Sun­day Guardian asked the Prime Min­is­ter his thoughts on to­day's open­ing of a PDP of­fice in Barataria and whether he was con­cerned about that and the fact that for­mer po­lit­i­cal play­ers like Vas­ant Bharath and Gary Grif­fith had al­so sig­nalled their re­spec­tive in­ten­tions to re-en­ter the po­lit­i­cal fray.

"What does that have to do with me? This is still a free coun­try where there is free­dom of as­so­ci­a­tion," the Prime Min­is­ter said.