Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

The To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty (TPP) will screen can­di­dates for To­ba­go East and To­ba­go West to­mor­row and Tues­day as it pre­pares for the 2025 gen­er­al elec­tion. The one-year-old par­ty re­ceived eight nom­i­na­tions—six for To­ba­go East and two for To­ba­go West.

The nom­i­nees for To­ba­go East are for­mer ACP William Nurse, re­tired head of To­ba­go Fire Ser­vice Di­vi­sion David Thomas, for­mer as­sem­bly­man Max James, THA tech­ni­cal ad­vis­er Anslem Richards, TPP’s chair­man Ann Sec­ond, and William Trim.

For To­ba­go West, Trevor James, THA’s In­fra­struc­ture Sec­re­tary, and Bar­ry Nel­son have put for­ward their names.

Deputy po­lit­i­cal leader Faith Breb­nor told Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, “All of the dis­trict coun­cils and ac­tion groups have been meet­ing and de­cid­ing on which of the can­di­dates are our favourites, and that in­for­ma­tion is be­ing com­mu­ni­cat­ed to the lead­er­ship of the or­gan­i­sa­tion.”

Breb­nor said the par­ty was ex­cit­ed about the process con­sid­er­ing this was its first screen­ing process for an elec­tion since it was formed in 2023.

Po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Shame Mo­hammed be­lieves any of the nom­i­nees who have put them­selves for­ward have a sol­id chance.

“In this com­plex and very dy­nam­ic po­lit­i­cal sce­nario we are go­ing to be en­ter­ing in­to, they must be mind­ful of the role To­ba­go will play in gov­er­nance or even as an op­po­si­tion par­ty. And, there­fore, there are cer­tain qual­i­ties and strate­gies that must be ex­em­pli­fied in or­der to make them an ide­al can­di­date.”

The par­ty said if no can­di­date ws deemed suit­able, nom­i­na­tions could be re­opened.

In a TV in­ter­view on Fri­day, TPP Po­lit­i­cal Leader Far­ley Au­gus­tine said all nom­i­nees have a strong chance of win­ning. How­ev­er, the par­ty’s fo­cus ex­tends be­yond vic­to­ry, push­ing for im­proved rep­re­sen­ta­tion of the is­land in Par­lia­ment.