Through­out the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, all eyes have been on Min­is­ter of Health Ter­rence Deyals­ingh as the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) led ad­min­is­tra­tion was tasked to pro­tect the coun­try from the virus which has al­ready killed over 500,000 peo­ple world­wide and in­fect­ed mil­lions more. How­ev­er, Deyals­ingh is not claim­ing any ad­van­tage from this pub­lic­i­ty for the up­com­ing gen­er­al elec­tion as he seeks to hold on to his St Joseph seat he held since 2013.

Scat­tered show­ers across south Trinidad did not damp­en the usu­al flare which Nom­i­na­tion Day has grown ac­cus­tomed to and even de­spite calls to ad­here to lim­it­ing gath­er­ings to no more twen­ty-five, scores of par­ty sup­port­ers ral­lied be­hind their re­spec­tive can­di­dates who inched clos­er to en­ter­ing the elec­tion gayelle.

Can­di­dates for po­lit­i­cal par­ties hop­ing to con­test the 41 seats in the Au­gust 10 Gen­er­al Elec­tion, filed nom­i­na­tion pa­pers at the of­fices of Re­turn­ing Of­fi­cers yes­ter­day. Guardian Me­dia’s pho­tog­ra­phers cap­tured the fan­fare that ac­com­pa­nied the nom­i­na­tions acrossed the coun­try.

That was how yes­ter­day’s Nom­i­na­tion Day ex­er­cis­es for Gen­er­al Elec­tion can­di­dates went down in a num­ber of con­stituen­cies.

Un­em­ploy­ment among young peo­ple has been high­light­ed as the ma­jor is­sue af­fect­ing the La Hor­quet­ta/Tal­paro con­stituen­cy. 

A to­tal of eight can­di­dates sealed their bids to con­test the Au­gust 10 gen­er­al elec­tion af­ter they filed their nom­i­na­tion pa­pers on Fri­day. Three can­di­dates will con­test the To­ba­go East Con­stituen­cy, while five are eye­ing the To­ba­go West seat.

The race for Tu­na­puna be­gan yes­ter­day, with Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress can­di­date David Nahkid out­pac­ing the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment’s Es­mond Forde to the re­turn­ing of­fi­cer’s of­fice at the El Do­ra­do Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre to file nom­i­na­tion pa­pers.

Ju­bi­lant cel­e­bra­tions on Nom­i­na­tion Day for one po­lit­i­cal par­ty were near­ly eclipsed over re­ports that a can­di­date had been re­placed af­ter al­le­ga­tions that a dark cloud was hang­ing over his head.

Po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Win­ford James says Op­po­si­tion leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s racial­ly-tinged at­tack against Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley will un­doubt­ed­ly have reper­cus­sions dur­ing the Gen­er­al Elec­tion cam­paign.

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley has ac­cused Op­po­si­tion leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar of wag­ing an­oth­er racial­ly-mo­ti­vat­ed cam­paign, af­ter the lat­ter ap­peared to at­tack his race yet again dur­ing a vir­tu­al meet­ing on Thurs­day night.

Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress leader Kam­la Per­sad Bisses­sar SC is mak­ing it clear that Ravi Rati­ram re­mains the par­ty’s can­di­date for Cou­va North.

Chair­man of One To­ba­go Voice (OTV) steer­ing com­mit­tee, Ho­choy Charles, says OTV is back­ing the Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) To­ba­go West can­di­date, Tashia Grace Bur­ris.