An­drea Perez-Sobers

Se­nior Re­porter

an­drea.perez-sobers@guardian.co.tt

Al­though the Pro­gres­sive Em­pow­er­ment Par­ty (PEP) failed to win dis­tricts in any of the 14 mu­nic­i­pal cor­po­ra­tions in Mon­day’s lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tions, the par­ty is al­ready fo­cus­ing its en­er­gies on the 2025 gen­er­al elec­tion.

The mood at the par­ty’s head­quar­ters at Quad Build­ing, Park Street, Port-of-Spain, was hope­ful on Mon­day night but quick­ly turned to dis­ap­point­ment when the num­bers start­ed trick­ling in just be­fore 8 pm. Short­ly be­fore 10.15 pm, po­lit­i­cal leader Phillip Ed­ward Alexan­der called a news con­fer­ence with the hand­ful of sup­port­ers left at the head­quar­ters. He told them the po­lit­i­cal par­ty had now qual­i­fied to be con­sid­ered as T&T’s third par­ty.

Alexan­der said the par­ty will fo­cus on the up­com­ing gen­er­al elec­tions by plac­ing shad­ow rep­re­sen­ta­tives on the ground in var­i­ous com­mu­ni­ties.

He said on­ly 30 per cent of the pop­u­la­tion had vot­ed, so there had been no room for PEP to make in­roads.

“All of the po­lit­i­cal par­ties shared 30 per cent of the vote. Where is the rest of the coun­try? I was dis­ap­point­ed that we did not get the full 141 can­di­dates. We need to de­vel­op a cul­ture of po­lit­i­cal re­spon­si­bil­i­ty, we need to meet peo­ple to un­der­stand that the vot­er owns the coun­try,” Alexan­der said.

He told sup­port­ers the PEP aims to build a strong and vi­able al­ter­na­tive to the pol­i­tics of race and cor­rup­tion.

“I think that in 2025, the PEP is go­ing to make a sig­nif­i­cant im­pact on the way this coun­try is gov­erned. Oth­er po­lit­i­cal par­ties have lost ground and their rep­u­ta­tion. The PEP has stayed true to our call. We are now es­tab­lished as the third largest par­ty in the coun­try and there is no oth­er than the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM), the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) and the PEP mov­ing to­wards the gen­er­al elec­tion,” he de­clared.

Alexan­der said he didn’t ex­pect is­sues raised by cit­i­zens dur­ing the cam­paign to be ad­dressed by the PNM and UNC.

“We will still have no roads, no wa­ter, no jobs. On­ly busi­ness­peo­ple would still be able to ob­tain for­eign ex­change. We do not have a Trinidad and To­ba­go that runs for every creed and race. We need peo­ple to say that they want rep­re­sen­ta­tion and must go be­yond red and yel­low,” he said

Alexan­der said while the par­ty had teamed up with the Re-Unit­ed Farm­ers’ Al­liance for the LGE, for the gen­er­al elec­tions mem­bers will now be in­te­grat­ed un­der the um­brel­la of the PEP.

A few sup­port­ers, who wished not to be named, said they were shocked by the re­sults as they had ex­pect­ed to win at least two seats.

“From the cam­paign­ing we did in the Port-of-Spain and Diego Mar­tin dis­tricts and the sup­port the par­ty got, we ex­pect­ed to ei­ther gain seats or in­roads. Peo­ple are afraid of change and still have this one set mind from Dr Er­ic Williams’ days,” one sup­port­er said.