DA­REECE PO­LO

Se­nior Re­porter

da­reece.po­lo@guardian.co.tt

With the 2025 Gen­er­al Elec­tion on the hori­zon, the dom­i­nance of the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) and the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) re­mains un­de­ni­able.

How­ev­er, be­yond these two po­lit­i­cal pow­er­hous­es, a wave of small­er par­ties are step­ping in­to the race, de­ter­mined to chal­lenge the sta­tus quo. But are vot­ers tak­ing no­tice? And do these emerg­ing par­ties have a re­al shot at dis­rupt­ing the tra­di­tion­al strong­hold?

In the 2020 elec­tion, 18 par­ties con­test­ed the polls, but the PNM nar­row­ly won with 22 seats to the UNC’s 19. The up­com­ing April 28 gen­er­al elec­tion is shap­ing up to be just as com­pet­i­tive.

At least 18 oth­er po­lit­i­cal par­ties are con­sid­er­ing con­test­ing the polls, with sev­en eye­ing the two To­ba­go seats.

Amid the brief elec­tion sea­son, the so­cial me­dia pages of politi­cians ooze con­fi­dence, por­tray­ing in­di­vid­u­als ea­ger to prove they de­serve a place in rep­re­sen­ta­tion­al pol­i­tics—whether as new­com­ers or re­turn­ing for an­oth­er term.

Coali­tions as strat­e­gy

Giv­en the po­lit­i­cal dom­i­nance of the PNM, which was found­ed in 1956 and re­mains the coun­try’s old­est par­ty, sev­er­al small­er ones have formed coali­tions to chal­lenge them.

The UNC has es­tab­lished a Coali­tion of In­ter­ests, part­ner­ing with the Laven­tille Out­reach for Ver­ti­cal En­rich­ment (LOVE) move­ment, the Pro­gres­sive Em­pow­er­ment Par­ty (PEP), the Oil­fields Work­ers’ Trade Union (OW­TU), and oth­er unions in its bid to un­seat the PNM.

This mir­rors the Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship ad­min­is­tra­tion of 2010 when the UNC teamed up with trade unions to de­feat the PNM 29-12. That coali­tion in­clud­ed the Con­gress of the Peo­ple (COP), the To­ba­go Or­gan­i­sa­tion of the Peo­ple (TOP), the Na­tion­al Joint Ac­tion Con­gress (NJAC), and the Move­ment for So­cial Jus­tice (MSJ).

How­ev­er, this time, the UNC has held pri­vate ne­go­ti­a­tions with sev­er­al trade unions but has re­ject­ed any coali­tion with the Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance, led by for­mer na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty min­is­ter Gary Grif­fith.

Mean­while, Grif­fith has teamed up with Hon­esty, Op­por­tu­ni­ty, Per­for­mance and Em­pow­er­ment (HOPE) and the Com­mu­ni­ty Ref­or­ma­tion Net­work to form the Peo­ple’s Al­liance. HOPE of­fi­cial­ly with­drew from the gen­er­al elec­tion on Mon­day but pledged to con­tin­ue col­lab­o­rat­ing with the al­liance.

To­ba­go’s po­lit­i­cal di­vide

The Op­po­si­tion is not sub­mit­ting any can­di­dates for To­ba­go, while sev­er­al par­ties con­test­ing the To­ba­go East and West seats have no in­ter­est in form­ing al­liances.

To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty (TPP) deputy po­lit­i­cal leader, Dr Faith Breb­nor, says the par­ty, led by Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine, is fo­cused on To­ba­go’s in­ter­ests and has no plans for coali­tions.

“The TPP, at this point, will not con­sid­er any coali­tion. We are go­ing in­to this to win those two seats out­right, and then we will use them, as the po­lit­i­cal leader has stat­ed pub­licly, to ne­go­ti­ate on be­half of the peo­ple of To­ba­go,” she said.

Nick­o­cy Phillips, leader of the Uni­ty of the Peo­ple’s Par­ty, ex­pressed sim­i­lar sen­ti­ments.

“For the past few years, we have been reach­ing out to a lot of these po­lit­i­cal par­ties. Some of them have been very dis­re­spect­ful to ask me to step aside and be in the back­ground and let them take the fore­front. And I am not go­ing to do that,” Phillips said.

Mean­while, the In­no­v­a­tive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Al­liance (IDA) is al­so con­test­ing in­de­pen­dent­ly and does not feel threat­ened by the TPP, which cur­rent­ly con­trols the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA).

“Peo­ple are tired of the non-de­liv­ery of the PNM in To­ba­go. They’re al­so very dis­ap­point­ed in what the TPP has been do­ing in To­ba­go with the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly and the econ­o­my in To­ba­go. Peo­ple are re­al­ly feel­ing the pain in To­ba­go. And there­fore, they are not en­thused with the TPP.”

Small­er Trinidad par­ties aim for change

Across Trinidad, small­er po­lit­i­cal par­ties are work­ing to sway vot­ers away from the two po­lit­i­cal jug­ger­nauts, promis­ing re­al change and a fresh al­ter­na­tive.

Trinidad Hu­man­i­ty Cam­paign (THC) po­lit­i­cal leader Mar­cus Ramkissoon said he was mo­ti­vat­ed by a de­sire to root out cor­rup­tion and hoped to con­test sev­en seats, in­clud­ing the two To­ba­go seats, for the first time.

“Every cit­i­zen of Trinidad and To­ba­go knows that our lead­er­ship en­gages in cor­rup­tion on one lev­el or an­oth­er. But we have got­ten so ac­cus­tomed to it in Trinidad and To­ba­go that we pass it off as noth­ing, that that is sup­posed to hap­pen, that every leader in lead­er­ship sup­posed, well, I am here to make a stand and show and state that not every leader and every lead­er­ship needs to be in cor­rup­tion.”

The Trinidad and To­ba­go De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Front (TDF) is con­test­ing the Point Fortin seat, along with Barataria/San Juan and San­ta Cruz.

TDF chair­woman Leslie Pasea em­pha­sised the need for po­lit­i­cal trans­for­ma­tion.

“It’s time now for a change. And as I said, you know, we’re try­ing to bring about lead­er­ship more than pol­i­tics be­cause it’s too much games. You know, peo­ple have lost hearts in this coun­try, and we want to bring it back.”

Pa­tri­ot Front po­lit­i­cal leader Mick­ela Pan­day be­lieves the biggest hur­dle for third par­ties is cam­paign fi­nanc­ing, which gives the es­tab­lished par­ties an ad­van­tage.

“The biggest hur­dle prob­a­bly is the un­fair­ness in fi­nanc­ing. I think be­cause there is no cam­paign fi­nance re­form that both these par­ties have promised. I think it’s dif­fi­cult. You can’t com­pete with them in fi­nances, but def­i­nite­ly in the cal­i­bre of can­di­dates, we will be on top,” Pan­day said.

Mean­while, All Peo­ple’s Par­ty po­lit­i­cal leader Kezel Jack­son, a for­mer ex­ec­u­tive mem­ber of the PDP, be­lieves her par­ty stands out.

“Why is APP so dif­fer­ent? I say that most politi­cians don’t have a re­sume to be a politi­cian. And if I should add a re­sume to it, it will be com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice first.”

She al­so crit­i­cised the PNM gov­ern­ment, claim­ing the na­tion had no di­rec­tion.

“We are stran­gled right now. With­out a vi­sion for growth, there is ab­solute­ly no vi­sion on the ta­ble.”

The MSJ, In­de­pen­dent Lib­er­al Par­ty, One To­ba­go Voice, Pro­gres­sive Par­ty, Na­tion­al Or­gan­i­sa­tion of We the Peo­ple and HOPE are among the par­ties that have opt­ed out of these elec­tions.

Mean­while, NTA leader Grif­fith stressed the im­por­tance of third par­ties and con­demned rhetoric from PEP leader Phillip Ed­ward Alexan­der, who re­ferred to Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar as a gen­er­al and spoke of head­ing for war.

Grif­fith called for a clean and fair elec­tion.

“I ask the pub­lic, do not be fooled in­to be­ing mis­led in­to try­ing to turn this elec­tion in­to a war. It is not a war. It is noth­ing more than an elec­tion cam­paign.”

Pub­lic un­moved by new op­tions

De­spite the grow­ing num­ber of al­ter­na­tive par­ties, many vot­ers re­main in­dif­fer­ent.

Leav­ing her work­place on Wednes­day af­ter­noon in the swel­ter­ing heat, Char­lieville ac­coun­tant Fe­l­isha Mo­hammed briefly an­swered Guardian Me­dia’s ques­tions be­fore board­ing a taxi home.

The 20-year-old, vot­ing for the sec­ond time, said she has on­ly heard of one al­ter­na­tive par­ty, the Pa­tri­ot­ic Front, but was un­like­ly to vote for them.

“I don’t think so. I think it’s still in de­vel­op­ment,” she said.

Point Fortin taxi dri­ver Bran­don Hud­son couldn’t name a sin­gle al­ter­na­tive par­ty and ad­mit­ted he does not re­side in Trinidad.

Laven­tille res­i­dent and nurs­ing stu­dent Ray­man­da Thomas iden­ti­fied the PEP and Pa­tri­ot­ic Front, led by the daugh­ter of for­mer prime min­is­ter and UNC founder Bas­deo Pan­day. How­ev­er, she was un­will­ing to vote for an al­ter­na­tive to the UNC or PNM.

“I think I’ll go for the one that shows more pro­duc­tiv­i­ty,” she said, with­out re­veal­ing her choice.

While many oth­ers have ex­pressed in­ter­est in mul­ti­ple seats, the re­al test be­gins on April 4 when nom­i­na­tion pa­pers are of­fi­cial­ly sub­mit­ted.

An­a­lysts: Small­er par­ties tar­get­ing dis­en­chant­ed vot­ers

Weigh­ing in on the im­pact small­er po­lit­i­cal par­ties could have, po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Win­ford James said peo­ple want change, and through small­er third par­ties, they hope to sway UNC and PNM vot­ers. He added, “They tar­get peo­ple who are dis­en­chant­ed with the lead­er­ship their par­ty of­fers. Peo­ple want change, and the way to get change is through the third par­ties, but the third par­ties don’t have a base. They don’t have a race base like the UNC or the PNM.”

He fur­ther added that there will al­ways be an at­trac­tion to third par­ties as ve­hi­cles to which their elec­toral am­bi­tions can be achieved.

Mean­while, an­oth­er po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst, Dr Maukesh Bas­deo, said with vot­er turnout across the last three gen­er­al elec­tions around 60 per cent, small­er par­ties aim to pounce on those who are not vot­ing. He said, “What is clear in the last three or four elec­tions is that we can claim that there is a sig­nif­i­cant 35 per cent strong, maybe high­er in some in­stances, where vot­ers do not par­tic­i­pate or vote in an elec­tion. The idea be­hind the small­er or al­ter­na­tive par­ties is whether they can cap­i­talise and cap­ture that seg­ment of the vot­ers.”

He says that was the chal­lenge for small­er par­ties in the gen­er­al elec­tions.

Par­ties that have ex­pressed in­ter­est in con­test­ing the 2025 Gen­er­al Elec­tion

Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) – Trinidad/To­ba­go

Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC)

Con­gress of the Peo­ple (COP)

Move­ment for Na­tion­al De­vel­op­ment (MND)

Na­tion­al Coali­tion for Trans­for­ma­tion (NCT)

New Na­tion­al Vi­sion (NNV)

Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) - To­ba­go

Pro­gres­sive Em­pow­er­ment Par­ty (PEP)

Trinidad and To­ba­go De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Front (TDF)

Trinidad Hu­man­i­ty Cam­paign (THC)

The Na­tion­al Par­ty (TNP)

Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA) - Trinidad/To­ba­go

All Peo­ple’s Par­ty (APP)

Pa­tri­ot­ic Front (PF) - Trinidad/To­ba­go

To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty (TPP) - To­ba­go

In­no­v­a­tive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Al­liance (IDA) - To­ba­go

The Uni­ty of the Peo­ple (UTP) - Trinidad/To­ba­go

The Laven­tille Out­reach for Ver­ti­cal En­rich­ment

Trade unions in­clud­ing the Oil­field Work­ers' Trade Union have al­so sub­mit­ted can­di­dates in the elec­tion.