Three months af­ter he an­nounced he was bow­ing out of pol­i­tics, Op­po­si­tion MP Dr Fuad Khan has a change of heart.

The Barataria/San Juan MP said he in­tends to file his nom­i­na­tion pa­pers to fight the Barataria/San Juan seat in this year’s gen­er­al elec­tion.

Khan was one of sev­er­al sit­ting Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) MPs who sig­nalled their in­ten­tion to file nom­i­na­tion pa­pers be­fore the par­ty’s Feb­ru­ary 28 dead­line.

Yes­ter­day, MPs Dr Roodal Mooni­lal, Fazal Karim, Rod­ney Charles, Rush­ton Paray, Ra­mona Ram­di­al, Rudy In­dars­ingh, Chris­tine Newal­lo-Ho­sein, Dr Lack­ram Bo­doe and Bhoe Tewarie all ex­pressed an in­ter­est to sub­mit nom­i­na­tions forms to the par­ty in the com­ing days.

“A re­sound­ing, yes!” was Mooni­lal’s curt re­sponse when the ques­tion was put to him yes­ter­day by Guardian Me­dia.

“Def­i­nite­ly!” were Karim, In­dars­ingh and Paray’s re­ply.

UNC’s PRO and Sen­a­tor Ani­ta Haynes said she too will hand in her nom­i­na­tion pa­pers, but stopped short of say­ing which con­stituen­cy she was eye­ing.

Sen­a­tor Sad­dam Ho­sein said he had not con­sid­ered as yet.

“If I do. I will let you know,” Ho­sein said.

But word on the ground is that the UNC sees Ho­sein as a strong Cen­tral con­tender for the par­ty.

Dr Tim Gopeesingh said he had no com­ment to make on the mat­ter.

The UNC has 18 seats in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives against the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment’s 23.

On Sun­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar at a meet­ing in Cou­va an­nounced Sen­a­tor Sean Sobers and Kenya Charles as the can­di­dates for San Fer­nan­do West and St Ann’s East in the 2020 gen­er­al elec­tion, in­sist­ing the UNC was not in­ter­est­ed in peo­ple from the past but on forg­ing a new way for­ward with a mix of young and ex­pe­ri­enced.

Last year, Tabaquite MP Suraj Ram­bachan said he would not be seek­ing re­elec­tion.

Khan ex­plained that since his an­nounce­ment last No­vem­ber to give up pol­i­tics, his con­stituents and med­ical pa­tients have been beg­ging him to re­con­sid­er his de­ci­sion.

“They told me no way they will let me go. Every­body say­ing make this the last term be­cause they want to make sure we are in gov­ern­ment and they want the UNC to take no chances with the mar­gin­al Barataria/San Juan seat. Based on the out­pour­ing of sup­port I have been re­ceiv­ing I am re­con­sid­er­ing.”

Khan said the fi­nal de­ci­sion rests with Per­sad-Bisses­sar and the screen­ing com­mit­tee’s shoul­ders to ac­cept or re­ject him.

“I may not get it. But I am go­ing to give it a shot,” said Khan who served as MP for 25 years.

Khan said the PNM had placed the econ­o­my in an un­sta­ble po­si­tion which the UNC would have to re­build once in of­fice.

Haynes ad­mit­ted that she in­tend­ed to file a nom­i­na­tion form to the par­ty in a few days.

“I do in­tend to put in my nom­i­na­tions pa­per and sub­ject my­self to the screen­ing com­mit­tee.”

Ques­tioned if she was pushed by sup­port­ers, col­leagues or Per­sad-Bisses­sar to jump in­to the fray, Haynes said it was a com­bi­na­tion of all.

“When you have a strong sup­port sys­tem it makes a de­ci­sion of get­ting in­to pub­lic life a lot eas­i­er. “

She said many peo­ple have of­fered to serve the UNC to take T&T on a sus­tain­able path.

“I think I am ca­pa­ble and will­ing to do that.”

Since screen­ing opened last Au­gust, Haynes said the par­ty re­ceived over 300 ap­pli­ca­tions for the 39 con­stituen­cies.

The UNC will not con­test To­ba­go’s two seats.