The clank­ing of po­lit­i­cal ar­mour and chest-thump­ing rose an­oth­er notch af­ter Tues­day’s of­fi­cial an­nounce­ment of the April 28 Gen­er­al Elec­tion date, tipped in last week’s col­umn.

The bat­tle of par­ties’ sup­port bases—which is what it will be —will be launched af­ter the up­com­ing Shouter Bap­tist and Eid hol­i­days, ac­cord­ing to Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) and Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) of­fi­cials.

While the UNC says the writ­ing’s on the wall for PNM, rather than in the “Next Chap­ter” new Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young’s hint­ed as the PNM’s theme, the elec­tion has been in the mak­ing since 2023, de­vel­op­ing through­out 2024 in­to re­cent­ly: last Sun­day’s can­di­date pre­sen­ta­tion along­side ex-leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley’s de­par­ture, Young’s de­but, a new cab­i­net and the elec­tion date.

Whether the el­e­ment of sur­prise on every­thing works - rather than re­in­force con­cern about the PNM’s “se­cre­cy”—re­mains ahead. Some PN­Mites be­lieve a lat­er elec­tion would have helped, though ac­knowl­edg­ing that geopo­lit­i­cal and fi­nance bal­ances de­mand­ed an ear­li­er poll.

If Young’s tight­ly wound - as seen Thurs­day—PNM’s chal­lenge is clear. Be­yond be­ing a new PM amid peers and mi­nus Row­ley’s ex­pe­ri­ence, he still had Row­ley’s ral­ly speech cam­paign­ing heav­i­ly against the UNC. But in­com­ple­tion of work was con­firmed in speak­ers warn­ing against PN­MItes’ “stay­ing home.” In­deed, ac­tiv­i­ties be­gan an hour lat­er than ad­ver­tised due to slow ar­rivals.

Young’s walk­a­bouts con­tin­ue, with To­ba­go ac­tiv­i­ty ahead. PNM can­di­dates launch cam­paigns and of­fices this week­end. Al­so ahead: Privy Coun­cil de­ci­sions on the Mar­cia Ay­ers-Cae­sar mat­ter. Young’s first trip over­seas is ex­pect­ed next week to Cari­com’s meet­ing on US/Cu­ba visa re­stric­tion. Who acts as PM then will re­veal where Young’s re­liance lies.

Cab­i­net changes telegraphed in­dict­ments on cer­tain min­is­ters’ per­for­mance, val­i­dat­ing the UNC’s crit­i­cism dur­ing the term—which ham­strings Young’s boasts about the team’s ef­fec­tive­ness.

Colm Im­bert’s been de­mot­ed from Fi­nance to Pub­lic Util­i­ties, re­placed by his for­mer per­ma­nent sec­re­tary Vish­nu Dhan­paul. Two Min­is­ters in Fi­nance are as­sist­ing in­stead of Bri­an Man­ning alone. Fitzger­ald Hinds has been de­mot­ed from Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty to Min­is­ter of State, a rank he’d held pri­or to 2020 pro­mo­tion to full min­is­ter.

It was al­so an in­dict­ment on Row­ley’s judge­ment af­ter his 020 boast that Im­bert—who’s now tot­ed Fi­nance for 10 years mi­nus IMF re­course or work­er re­duc­tion—re­mained the best man for Fi­nance. Young’s meet­ing with re­li­gious rep­re­sen­ta­tives al­so brought the Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter’s per­for­mance in­to fo­cus.

Young re­tained En­er­gy to se­cure projects un­der his tenure since his cred­i­bil­i­ty—and Gov­ern­ment’s elec­tion chances—ride on that. Changes could oc­cur if the PNM wins elec­tion, but there are cur­rent ben­e­fits from the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al be­ing chair­man of PNM’s strongest unit—Women’s League chair­man Camille Robin­son-Reg­is, a staunch sup­port­er since Young be­gan act­ing as PM.

On the 40 days to elec­tion, Young’s first tri­al is his CIC school­days is­sue with fel­low stu­dent Im­ran Khan.

Be­yond ad­mis­sions on his school days in He­li­co­nia Foun­da­tion’s 2021 in­ter­view, as new PM, fac­ing a gen­er­al elec­tion—with iffy foot­ing in the par­ty and in pub­lic, Young was lim­it­ed to gen­er­al dam­age con­trol, mi­nus di­rect ac­cep­tance and apol­o­gy to Khan.

But he must know, as T&T’s top pub­lic fig­ure—par­tic­u­lar­ly in the way he’s as­cend­ed—every ac­tion, judge­ment, sup­port of, or con­don­ing is un­der scruti­ny, stand­ing to al­so af­fect the judge­ment/im­age of Row­ley, MPs and the par­ty who sanc­tioned him.

With the per­son­al in­ci­dent spun as bring­ing bul­ly­ing to the fore for at­ten­tion, it’s ahead what prompt­ed Young’s first de­c­la­ra­tion to now ad­dress do­mes­tic/vi­o­lence to­wards women. The sin­cer­i­ty of that pledge has to with­stand Young’s vul­gar Oc­to­ber 2024 “za­m­my” state­ments about the UNC’s leader.

The snap poll hasn’t af­fect­ed the Op­po­si­tion, as UNC’s cam­paign peak cross­roads ar­rives with a de­ci­sion on “dis­si­dent“ Ma­yaro MP Rus­ton Paray. What­ev­er de­ci­sion aids UNC’s com­fort zone or com­pounds chal­lenges—be­yond the PNM.

The UNC’s tar­get­ed the Afro-T&T base, as PNM has the In­do-T&T sec­tor. PNM’s ral­ly showed the in­jec­tion of such, sup­port­ing can­di­dates in some UNC-held ar­eas.

How­ev­er, ex-min­is­ter Vas­ant Bharath, who at­tend­ed Mon­day’s UNC Brazil meet­ing—and has at­tend­ed closed-door meet­ings with leader Per­sad-Bisses­sar—wasn’t at UNC’s meet­ing in the seat he’d held: St Au­gus­tine, where in­cum­bent MP Kadi­jah Ameen’s en­er­getic de­liv­ery con­firmed her can­di­da­cy. UNC’s can­di­dates are in hand along­side the par­ty’s man­i­festo.

The rest of the “40 days” road pro­gress­es.