Category: UNC-A

Kamla Persad-Bissessar Takes Over [A Part Of] The Opposition

January 24, 2010 by Taran Rampersad

According to the twittersphere, Kamla Persad-Bissessar has won the United National Congress Alliance internal election. For the nosebleed section, that means that Basdeo Panday is no longer running the show.

A lot has been written about this election. A lot has been said about how important it is for a change of leadership or a lack of change of leadership within the UNC-A. All of that stops now - the leadership has changed. As is to be expected, Kamla Persad-Bissessar has a lot of things she now has to live up to. 

She should know that I'm not a part of that weight. I've learned over the years not to believe anything said before an election. I didn't vote for her (or the others!) and thus I have the least expectations of her. In this way, I'm probably be her best friend a year or two from now.

That being said, there has been some mention of a coalition between COP and the UNC-A. What it should be, if they want to wedge their way back into the misdirected Westminster system, is a reconciliation between the two groups of supporters. The UNC-A supporters strongly echoed the sentiments of a split vote yet the voices from which they echoed did not openly recognize the fact that the vote was split because people didn't believe they weren't very good at Opposition. If the last two elections have demonstrated anything, it is the lack of popular support of the party parading (barely) as Opposition.

Will Kamla change that? She can't. Not by herself. She'll need support for that. And when this is all said and done, will Kamla still be in charge of Opposition?

No one knows, everyone has an opinion - but Time reveals everything. I'll wait for Time.

Is Trinidad and Tobago Beyond Race Based Politics?

October 26, 2009 by Taran Rampersad

Yesterday, Selwyn Ryan wrote, 'The UDeCOTT election: round 1' - and within it he wrote something that should be apparent to anyone who isn't in Parliament:

...Mr Imbert brags that the central issue in the Inquiry will not be UDeCOTT, but the cartelisation of the local construction industry, the nature of the Opposition, and much else. He boasted that "the election will be about who is fit to run the country, which is the best party to run the country, who has the moral authority to run the country, and who is best equipped to serve the people of the country". The problem, however, is that none of the parties, including the PNM, is seen as having any abundance of these qualities...

Exactly. But the next sentence is disturbing:

...Mr Panday is also correct when he notes that corruption, on its own, does not decide elections in Trinidad: Race does...

I don't know that Basdeo Panday actually said that race wins elections, and it's a little disturbing to consider that it could be true... and that it could be considered true enough for a politician to say. Was it true? Of course it was. Lets just say that when it comes to race in politics, Trinidad and Tobago has a colourful past. We all know it. There are people who will talk bad about a political party, but when it comes to election day people are likely to vote with their raw prejudice. {Read more}