DA­REECE PO­LO

Se­nior Re­porter

da­reece.po­lo@guardian.co.tt

​In the wake of the April 28 Gen­er­al Elec­tion, the fu­ture of 14 un­suc­cess­ful po­lit­i­cal par­ties re­mains un­cer­tain.

In the case of the Pro­gres­sive Em­pow­er­ment Par­ty (PEP), po­lit­i­cal leader Phillip Ed­ward Alexan­der said the par­ty will soon be dis­band­ed as he plans to for­mal­ly join the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC).

Alexan­der said the de­ci­sion was made af­ter con­sul­ta­tion with, and the full sup­port of, the PEP ex­ec­u­tive.

“We were formed to bring cer­tain an­ti-es­tab­lish­ment poli­cies to the front that have now be­come foun­da­tion poli­cies of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress and the coali­tion so us wear­ing two dif­fer­ent shoes, for want of a bet­ter anal­o­gy, makes no sense any more,” he said.

While he claimed no promis­es have been made to him, Alexan­der ex­pressed hope that he might one day be in a po­si­tion to help ad­dress the coun­try’s wa­ter is­sues.

“Hon­est­ly, I have fought for wa­ter for so long and I know that our wa­ter poli­cies solve flood­ing and wa­ter... That there could be no more drought in the coun­try. I would have loved, maybe at some point, I might get a chance to try that. I would have loved to be the per­son that solves the wa­ter prob­lems in Trinidad.”

He said he an­tic­i­pates roles for mem­bers of the PEP with­in the UNC.

Alexan­der al­so em­pha­sised that al­though he sup­ports Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, he re­mains com­mit­ted to hold­ing her ac­count­able if things go awry.

“I think she knows that in­side my chest beats a heart that can­not be a par­ty to fool­ish­ness so that I know how im­por­tant this coali­tion is to her. I know how im­por­tant fix­ing this coun­try is to her.

“I am ded­i­cat­ed to that. So, bar­ring some­thing go­ing mad, like the PNM that went mad—which I don’t see com­ing—I’ll al­ways be Phillip Ed­ward Alexan­der.”

Pa­tri­ot­ic Front (PF) po­lit­i­cal leader Mick­ela Pan­day cel­e­brat­ed her par­ty’s abil­i­ty to field 37 can­di­dates in its first gen­er­al elec­tion, de­spite al­leged­ly fac­ing in­tim­i­da­tion and last-minute with­drawals.

She con­firmed the PF’s com­mit­ment to re­main­ing ac­tive in na­tion­al pol­i­tics, strength­en­ing its in­ter­nal struc­ture and en­gag­ing young peo­ple in lead­er­ship roles.

Pan­day called on the new Gov­ern­ment to pri­ori­tise cam­paign fi­nance re­form, job cre­ation, and trans­paren­cy, warn­ing against the re­turn to po­lit­i­cal pa­tron­age.

“We are hop­ing that the new Gov­ern­ment will ap­point peo­ple al­so based on mer­i­toc­ra­cy and not with the po­lit­i­cal pa­tron­age and crony­ism that we’ve seen.” she said.

“We al­so know that mil­lions and mil­lions and mil­lions, sure­ly hun­dreds of mil­lions of dol­lars, were spent dur­ing an elec­tion which could have been spent oth­er­wise by both of the par­ties, and we would hope that there will not be­come a pay­back ses­sion to hap­pen for the monies that were giv­en, be­cause of course there was no trans­paren­cy in that at all.”

Pan­day al­so urged swift ac­tion on promis­es made dur­ing the cam­paign.

“Peo­ple are suf­fer­ing, peo­ple can’t eat, feed their fam­i­lies, there’s no jobs. We’re hop­ing that jobs will be cre­at­ed, and a lot of promis­es were made. What I would like to see is, not like we’d seen with the last gov­ern­ment, you keep blam­ing the gov­ern­ment be­fore,” she said.

She added that while the Pa­tri­ot­ic Front re­mains a young move­ment, it is com­mit­ted to grow­ing be­yond her brand and in­tro­duc­ing the pub­lic to a wider team. Pan­day al­so not­ed that while they did not win any seats in the Par­lia­ment, they will hold the gov­ern­ment ac­count­able like any re­spon­si­ble op­po­si­tion.

“I would def­i­nite­ly hope that we would not hear the amount of al­le­ga­tions of cor­rup­tion that came up the last time, and I think peo­ple learn from their mis­takes. It’ll be the sec­ond time around, and I tru­ly wish them well, be­cause for them to fail would mean that the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go will be hurt.”

Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA) leader Gary Grif­fith said he in­tends to con­sult with the par­ty’s ex­ec­u­tive be­fore mak­ing any pub­lic an­nounce­ment about the par­ty’s fu­ture.

Wat­son Duke said he will ad­dress the fu­ture of the Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) next week.