If Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley will have a lot to talk about at tonight’s (Sat) St Joseph meet­ing, Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar can be cred­it­ed for con­tribut­ing ma­te­r­i­al with her “light ‘em up” and “load the ‘mat­ic’” lob­by.

Par­ties head in­to the fi­nal week be­fore the Au­gust 14 Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Elec­tion work­ing the “ground” fever­ish­ly ahead of Mon­day’s start of spe­cial vot­ing from among the 1,091,936 elec­torate.

Pre-elec­tion week and spe­cial vot­ing ar­rives the same time that the PNM Gov­ern­ment and UNC Op­po­si­tion re­spec­tive­ly mark (on Thurs­day) the third an­niver­sary of their sec­ond term since the Au­gust 10, 2020 Gen­er­al Elec­tion.

Each were elect­ed for the first time to po­si­tions on Sep­tem­ber 7, 2015. In 2020, vot­ers re­turned them there un­til 2025. Both have weath­ered chal­lenges and changes lead­ing to this LG elec­tion, which sets the stage for their re­spec­tive po­lit­i­cal fates.

Thurs­day’s an­niver­sary, at four days be­fore LG elec­tion, is an­oth­er com­po­nent of the cam­paign: pub­lic votes will pro­nounce re­spec­tive rat­ings more than as­sort­ed as­sess­ments.

The cur­tain rais­er for re­views be­gan with PNM’s Pa­lo Seco “Con­ver­sa­tions with the Prime Min­is­ter,” where Row­ley ra­tio­nalised on is­sues, re­ply­ing to at­ten­dees’ ques­tions. The lack of in­for­ma­tion/un­der­stand­ing on mat­ters would have sig­nalled where PNM dis­con­nec­tion lies.

In­deed, his state­ment that the 2015-2022 pe­ri­od was “about the most dif­fi­cult pe­ri­od in post-In­de­pen­dence his­to­ry,” con­firms PNM’s fac­ing greater chal­lenges in this LG elec­tion. Plus it’s tes­ti­mo­ny of Gov­ern­ment’s per­for­mance - slid­ing from LG tie (2019), 22/19 seats (2020) to To­ba­go wipe­out (2021).

While Gov­ern­ment ne­go­ti­at­ed rocky pan­dem­ic straits, as­sort­ed fall­out, lo­cal/in­ter­na­tion­al changes and man­dates, de­spite cater­ing for COVID from vac­cines to grants, eco­nom­ic fray­ing par­tic­u­lar­ly, af­fect­ed its “ground” con­nec­tion. Sub­se­quent gang­land bids to re­coup down­time loss­es with dou­ble-time pace un­leashed a crime sit­u­a­tion which has jeop­ar­dised Gov­ern­ment’s im­age. Elec­tion re­sults will re­veal how well PNM’s pressed on and if di­vi­sions of its No­vem­ber 2022 par­ty elec­tion re­main. PNM’s pro­file re­cent­ly dipped as Gov­ern­ment host­ed Eman­ci­pa­tion guests. But in the elec­tion, which comes down to bat­tle­grounds, San Fer­nan­do (for PNM to hold) and San­gre Grande (dit­to UNC), in the week af­ter UNC’s Warn­er/Grif­fith ac­co­mo­da­tion aired, PNM on Thurs­day walked the Mara­bel­la Train Line seek­ing to re­in­force the (very) mar­gin­al Co­coyea-Tarou­ba, al­so Mara­bel­la West.

The UNC is re­in­forc­ing in San­gre Grande against PNM de­fences al­so tar­get­ing two more seats. Ac­knowl­edg­ing Grande’s sig­nif­i­cance, PNM’s next meet­ing is there and the fi­nal ral­ly at Ma­coya.

The UNC, whom Row­ley ac­cused of “sur­vival pol­i­tics,” has en­dured frag­men­ta­tion, and dis­en­chant­ed mem­bers, but rose 707 (2019 LG), won Moru­ga (2020) and found lee­way via le­gal mat­ters and aboard T&T’s crime prob­lem.

UNC’s base, re-en­er­gised by re­turnees Jack Warn­er and Gary Grif­fith, plus promise of “PP Gov­ern­ment “ is aid­ed by OW­TU sup­port, via re­spectable dis­tance of its PaP branch. UNC’s ral­ly next Sat­ur­day - salut­ing San­do tar­get - is in San Fer­nan­do.

If PNM is still in gov­ern­ment on Au­gust 15, Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s po­lit­i­cal fu­ture de­pends on the next eight days and UNC’s elec­tion re­sult. Rid­ing ac­com­mo­da­tion mo­men­tum, she’s reached for strength even at the price (so far) of in­tem­per­ate lan­guage and gen­er­al elec­tion-type promis­es.

How Per­sad-Bisss­sar’s bid to win Chris­t­ian votes - via choir ap­pear­ances at meet­ings and sup­port­ing Pres­by­te­ri­ans’ is­sues - fare with her lock ‘n load pol­i­tics and cham­pi­oning of con­tro­ver­sial Trini­bad stylings, re­mains ahead. Her pop­ulist pitch, feed­ing in­to and off of crime con­cerns (and hyped gun cul­ture) is a “dog whis­tle” to those seek­ing resti­tu­tion.

But her over­reach, which some UNC of­fi­cials mulled af­ter so­cial me­dia ex­cess­es on the is­sue, risks in­cit­ing vi­o­lence, re­tal­i­a­tion, racial over­tones and the irony of an­ti-crime “law” based on gun-tot­ing. Threat­en­ing her lead­er­ship stocks.

Grif­fith, pow­ered by cer­tain le­gal suc­cess­es, fur­ther sought spot­light by tar­get­ing the ex-Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion chair­man, whose re­ply is due Au­gust 16 - a mat­ter that won’t be con­clud­ed be­fore elec­tion but where wit­ness­es may re­veal why Grif­fith didn’t be­come Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er.

In this Blue Moon pe­ri­od (full moons Au­gust 1 and 30), days ahead will re­veal what po­lit­i­cal phe­nom­e­non aris­es - and what choic­es re­main for vot­ers be­tween the many rocks, hard places, dev­ils and deep blue sea.