Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has called for in­ter­na­tion­al ob­servers to be brought in­to Trinidad and To­ba­go for this coun­try's 2020 gen­er­al elec­tions.

She made the call at the UNC's Mon­day Night Fo­rum at the Union Clax­ton Bay Sec­ondary school. on Mon­day as she pre­sent­ed Taharq Obi­ka, an econ­o­mist and banker who has had stints in the Sen­ate and Michelle Ben­jamin as the par­ty's can­di­dates for Point Fortin and Moru­ga/Table­land re­spec­tive­ly.

Say­ing she want­ed all coun­cil­lors to work hard so they could end up in the Red House, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she wants free and fair elec­tions in T&T when the date is fi­nal­ly called.

Not­ing the po­si­tion of Cari­com in light of the cur­rent Guyana elec­tion im­passe and vi­o­lence which has erupt­ed there, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she hoped the Guyanese un­rest could be set­tled soon.

She claimed Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley had wrecked the T&T econ­o­my, not­ing the coun­try had $122 bil­lion in pub­lic sec­tor debts. She al­so said it was not true that the Op­po­si­tion had not sup­port­ed the Gov­ern­ment in pass­ing cru­cial leg­is­la­tion to curb crime.

"We sup­port­ed them with over 50 pieces of leg­is­la­tion," Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

"Rod­ney Charles brought the run­away crime mo­tion to Par­lia­ment but the Min­is­ter has no new plan, no new ideas. With the econ­o­my, it's on­ly bac­cha­nal and lies. They lie every time they speak."

The Op­po­si­tion Leader al­so said she will open the Cou­va Chil­dren's Hos­pi­tal when she gets in­to gov­ern­ment.

The UNC political leader revealed the two candidates at the party's Monday Night Forum in Pointe-a-Pierre

RISHI RAGOONATH

Ad­dress­ing the can­di­dates, Per­sad-Bisses­sar point­ed out that Obi­ka holds a BSC in eco­nom­ics and an MBA in Fi­nance.

"He served as a UNC sen­a­tor and is the head of op­er­a­tions as a se­nior cred­it an­a­lyst. He is al­so a writer and a his­to­ri­an. He is a proud son of Point Fortin," Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

Ben­jamin is the cur­rent coun­cil­lor for Hin­dus­tan, serv­ing her sec­ond term. Per­sad-Bisses­sar said Ben­jamin at­tend­ed Cowen Hamil­ton and holds a diplo­ma in Com­put­er Stud­ies and a BSc in En­vi­ron­men­tal and Nat­ur­al Re­source Man­age­ment and Bi­ol­o­gy from the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies.

"She is an ac­tive mem­ber of the Bap­tist com­mu­ni­ty and is al­so the chair of the Moru­ga Table­land con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive," Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

Mean­while, Op­po­si­tion Chief Whip David Lee al­so said the UNC had a Na­tion­al Eco­nom­ic Trans­for­ma­tion Plan for 2020 to 2025. He said this plan will trans­form the econ­o­my of T&T and will curb run­away crime.