GAIL ALEXAN­DER

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

UNC chair­man Dave Tan­coo has trashed the move­ment of some for­mer mem­bers now sup­port­ing the PNM, say­ing kar­ma will deal with them.

And PNM chair­man Stu­art Young has rub­bished UNC claims that some “PNM op­er­a­tives” are sup­ply­ing the UNC with in­for­ma­tion and clan­des­tine sup­port.

All of this af­ter cer­tain UNC of­fi­cials re­signed from the par­ty and joined the PNM—and as elec­tion high gear con­tin­ues with the start of the UNC’s screen­ing of its Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment elec­tion nom­i­nees to­mor­row (Thurs) and the close of PNM nom­i­na­tions on Fri­day.

The lat­est to “cross” from UNC to PNM were for­mer UNC Ari­ma Cen­tral coun­cil­lor Shel­don Gar­cia and ex-UNC Youth Arm of­fi­cer Kaveesh Siew­di­al. War­renville coun­cil­lor Samuel Sankar, who al­so re­signed from UNC, re­mains mum on his di­rec­tion. Gar­cia has of­fered him­self as a PNM nom­i­nee for Ari­ma Cen­tral for LG elec­tion.

A num­ber of in­cum­bents in both UNC and PNM are seek­ing re­turn. But new faces are ex­pect­ed for PNM in ar­eas in­clud­ing PoS, Diego Mar­tin and oth­er East-West cor­ri­dor cor­po­ra­tions, Ch­agua­nas and San Fer­nan­do.

UNC is al­so ex­pect­ed to have new faces among oth­ers in San­gre Grande, San Fer­nan­do, Ari­ma, East-West cor­ri­dor ar­eas and San Juan.

On Mon­day, UNC’s Tan­coo, em­pha­sis­ing the par­ty will win LG polls, said, “Any­body who en­dors­es the PNM track record of cor­rup­tion—the worst mur­der rate in his­to­ry, home in­va­sions and vi­o­lent rob­beries, fail­ure to pro­tect women and chil­dren, worse roads, flood­ing, un­re­li­able wa­ter sup­ply, prop­er­ty tax, job­less­ness, high­er food prices, abuse of the law that the Privy Coun­cil had to cor­rect —does not have this coun­try at heart.

“Our coun­try is in eco­nom­ic and so­cial cri­sis be­cause of the de­lib­er­ate ac­tions of the PNM lead­er­ship. If they sup­port that, then they are en­dors­ing the suf­fer­a­tion of the coun­try for the ben­e­fit of a few.”

He added, “Kar­ma will deal with them. The UNC re­mains com­mit­ted to res­cu­ing this na­tion and fight­ing against op­pres­sion, cor­rup­tion and the emerg­ing dic­ta­tor­ship and we wel­come all to join us in res­cu­ing our na­tion,”

Af­ter the res­ig­na­tions, oth­er UNC of­fi­cials said the par­ty has “sev­er­al PNM op­er­a­tives,” in­clud­ing cer­tain cur­rent of­fi­cials who are “un­hap­py with the way PNM is be­ing run” and are pro­vid­ing clan­des­tine sup­port to the Op­po­si­tion.”

The UNC sources said the par­ty would al­low those per­sons to “re­main in place in the PNM to con­tin­ue ac­cess­ing in­for­ma­tion and plans from them.” Sev­er­al PNM Sen­a­tors de­nied they’re as­sist­ing UNC.

Among the main cor­po­ra­tion ar­eas re­gard­ed as mar­gin­al “swing” site for elec­tion vic­to­ry, PNM San Fer­nan­do LG co-or­di­na­tor (Agri­cul­ture Min­is­ter) Kaz­im Ho­sein didn’t an­swer calls.

But PNM San­gre Grande co-or­di­na­tor (To­co MP) Roger Munro told T&T Guardian on Mon­day, “All’s well in our arm of the par­ty. I’m not aware of any falling out. But we’re in a po­lit­i­cal at­mos­phere and if some may be dis­grun­tled or not, it’s left to be seen. How­ev­er, I think talk about PNM peo­ple ‘help­ing’ UNC is more like­ly a ‘sour grapes’ re­sponse to what’s hap­pen­ing with peo­ple leav­ing them.”

PNM chair­man Young, re­ply­ing to a query on the spec­u­la­tion, said, “The PNM is a po­lit­i­cal par­ty and a se­ri­ous in­sti­tu­tion that has with­stood the test of time. We are 68 years old and our struc­ture is a phe­nom­e­nal one that I’m proud to be a part of and to serve in.

“The UNC Op­po­si­tion is not a source of in­for­ma­tion that I’d place trust in. Un­for­tu­nate­ly, they ap­pear to be­lieve that mis­in­for­ma­tion, cre­at­ing con­fu­sion and mis­lead­ing the pop­u­la­tion is ben­e­fi­cial to them. I have con­fi­dence in the PNM and its abil­i­ty to con­tin­ue gov­ern­ing in the best in­ter­est of the peo­ple of T&T and I pay lit­tle re­gard to in­ten­tion­al Op­po­si­tion mis­chief.”