A.W. SangsterHAVING JUST spent a week's holiday in the Twin Island Republic (in Tobago) consider me an expert in T&T affairs! Seriously though, I could have been back home, considering some of the issues in the news.
Elections. These are constitutionally due in the last week of November, but the Prime Minister has an additional three months leeway to name the date (to fly the gate!) There are a number of constraints in selecting the date. Among these are: The Muslim Ramadan period (November 27-December 27); Christmas celebrations (December); Hindu Divali (October 26) and Carnival in February.
The options are not many and in addition the government which has had a very slender majority in the House is now faced with an even slimmer majority with the firing of a Cabinet minister while at the same time wanting to enact critical constitutional legislation. In addition the Boundaries Commission has a minimum five-week period from the calling of elections to the actual date. The campaign however is on in earnest and Prime Minister Panday has described the upcoming elections as the "Mother of all Election Battles." He has also said that, "they would not come as a thief in the night!"
There are the usual squabbles over the selection of party candidates. In fact there are those who are calling for the removal of the Leader of the Opposition and some Indian communities have complained that Mr. Panday has not looked after them properly, (spoils of office!). There have also been charges that supporters have been moved by the UNC (the ruling party) into marginal seats. In addition, Leader of the Opposition, Patrick Manning, of the PNM has requested the government to invite Commonwealth observers for the elections. We can remember the cass-cass in Jamaica in 1997 over the international observers (Carter Centre) and local observers (CAFFE).
The elections will be keenly contested as the sides are evenly balanced. Of the 36 seats in the House of Representatives, 14 are regarded as safe for both parties. There are 6 marginal seats in Trinidad with the polls at the present time putting the UNC marginally ahead. The two Tobago seats have been traditionally won by the small party - the National Alliance for Reconstruc-tion (NAR) the party of the current President of the Republic A.N.R. Robinson. They joined forces with the UNC to provide a parliamentary majority. There have been over the five years since the last elections a number of persons who have crossed the floor so that the general position is further complicated.
The two Tobago seats are however likely to be more keenly contested as a new party, the People's Empowerment Party (PEP) has announced its two general election candidates as well as its 12 candidates for the Tobago House of Assembly. Elections for the Tobago House of Assembly are due in December and speculations are that the Prime Minister might name these elections before the general elections in order to test the Tobago waters.
The government of Prime Minister Panday has a proud record of achievement. There are a number of specific achievements - a new airport soon to be opened, major road resurfacing programmes, many new schools built by government, or in partnership with religious groups, major new funding for secondary schools in the current budget - and the Republic is the economic powerhouse of the English-speaking Caribbean.
Free education: Education is technically free in T&T but the schools have had over many years to face the problem of a major deficit in the costs of operation, despite the subvention from the government. This has required the schools to engage in major fund-raising activities. The government has addressed the problem in the current budget.
The Press, the Govern-ment and Justice: I found that columnists in general seemed to be a lot more strident, abrasive and partisan. The two major newspapers, The Trinidad Guardian and the Express are largely controlled by the coloured or blacks. There has been an increasing situation of no love lost between Indian Prime Minister Basdeo Panday and the media. He has himself to blame but is clearly responding to a cultural situation.
Both the newspapers recently headlined the fact that the Prime Minister lost two cases in court. One had to do with the exclusion of the CCN group in the application for a cell-phone service licence and the other of media mogul Ken Gordon, the chairman of the CCN group, who was called a pseudo-racist by the Prime Minister in a speech to party supporters. The PM has been ordered to pay a fine of TT$700,000. He has said that he will appeal the ruling.
Another issue of interest is the conflict between the Chief Justice (CJ) and the Attorney-General (AG). The CJ a Manning appointee, who was brought in from outside and appointed over several other candidates claimed interference from the Executive by the AG. Prime Minister Panday appointed a high-level three-man commission of inquiry which included a former English Lord Chancellor as Chairman and distinguished African and Indian legal luminaries. The Guardian found the report generally unsatisfactory and noted that "the Commission shot down one by one the CJ's charges against the AG and agreed that the Judiciary should be subject to the executive and to Parliament." In addition it said: "It is astonishing that 38 years after independence, the nation needs to rehire an abandoned British nursemaid at great cost to the taxpayer to decide how our legal and judicial systems should function and that the result should be as unsatisfactory as the cause."
Political football: At a UNC party rally, leading party financier, Jack Warner, a vice president of FIFA and the President of CONCACAF, noted that he had negotiated with Panama to play their match against T&T in Trinidad so that the Prime Minister could attend for, said he, "every time he (the PM) ain't go we lose." The Express in its editorial comment remarked that "The development marks a disturbing attempt to politicise the football team in an already heated election season."
In our sister islands life is as interesting as it is in JA.
Postscript: Clearly our CARICOM partner Guyana has been betrayed in the new and quite unprincipled oil deal with Venezuela.
A.W. Sangster is former President of the University of Technology.
