Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley’s re­turn to T&T to­mor­row (Sun­day) will spark a flur­ry of po­lit­i­cal ac­tiv­i­ties, cul­mi­nat­ing with the pre­sen­ta­tion of the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment’s gen­er­al elec­tion can­di­dates next Sun­day, when Row­ley’s res­ig­na­tion will al­so be con­firmed—and a gen­er­al elec­tion date is ex­pect­ed soon af­ter.

As re­port­ed ex­clu­sive­ly by Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials on Thurs­day con­firmed mo­bil­i­sa­tion process­es were dis­cussed at that day’s Cab­i­net meet­ing and at Bal­isi­er House and work is in train.

Since the height­en­ing of ac­tiv­i­ty and Sun­day’s plans for the pre­sen­ta­tion of can­di­dates, spec­u­la­tion about an elec­tion date six weeks af­ter—April 28—has in­creased. That date has been spec­u­lat­ed on since the start of the year.

Row­ley an­nounced re­cent­ly that he will be re­sign­ing on March 16. He went to the US last Thurs­day on pri­vate busi­ness and is due back to­mor­row, PNM of­fi­cials said.

Af­ter re­turn­ing, Row­ley will launch sig­na­ture projects, in­clud­ing the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal Cen­tral block on Mon­day and the To­ba­go Air­port Ter­mi­nal project on Sat­ur­day.

He’s al­so ex­pect­ed to ad­dress PN­Mites on Mon­day.

Fol­low­ing this, PNM ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cials said plans are on for the par­ty’s cen­tral ex­ec­u­tive to meet at City Hall, Port-of-Spain from 1 pm next Sun­day—March 16—to rat­i­fy and en­dorse the gen­er­al elec­tion can­di­dates. They will then be pre­sent­ed at Wood­ford Square. Sources pro­ject­ed that Row­ley will speak then, con­firm­ing his res­ig­na­tion. The PNM has a tra­di­tion of launch­ing its gen­er­al elec­tion cam­paign by rat­i­fy­ing its can­di­dates at City Hall, then pre­sent­ing them at Wood­ford Square, with an ad­dress by the par­ty’s leader.

In this sce­nario, sources said, an elec­tion date—pos­si­bly April 28— could ar­rive six weeks lat­er.

With a res­ig­na­tion de­liv­ered by Row­ley, they said it is ex­pect­ed that prime min­is­ter-des­ig­nate Stu­art Young will sub­se­quent­ly be giv­en the au­thor­i­ty to func­tion—in­clud­ing the au­thor­i­ty to ad­vise the Pres­i­dent on a date for a gen­er­al elec­tion.

The let­ter signed by all PNM’s MPs sup­port­ing Young as Prime Min­is­ter is ex­pect­ed to be sent to the Pres­i­dent. Gov­ern­ment’s House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives leader Camille Robin­son-Reg­is didn’t re­ply yes­ter­day on the let­ter’s sta­tus and when ex­act­ly it will be pre­sent­ed to the Pres­i­dent.

The PNM has se­lect­ed prospec­tive can­di­dates for 40 con­stituen­cies out of 41.

A can­di­date for Tabaquite still has to be ap­proved af­ter ini­tial prospect Anil Ramjit was dropped. Tabaquite’s ex­ec­u­tive was man­dat­ed on Feb­ru­ary 17 to seek new nom­i­nees to present in two weeks from that date. On Thurs­day, PNM Tabaquite chair­man Cur­tis Shade said the nom­i­nee is an air host­ess. Par­ty of­fi­cials said Tabaquite’s screen­ing should be com­plet­ed “im­mi­nent­ly.”

NTA gets UNC mem­bers, ex­pects April poll

Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA) leader Gary Grif­fith said yes­ter­day he al­ways ex­pect­ed gen­er­al elec­tion to be around April 28.

“So, if on March 16 the PNM dis­plays its can­di­dates, it’s hard­ly like­ly the Gov­ern­ment would an­nounce their can­di­dates months be­fore an elec­tion.”

He said NTA has 15 can­di­dates in strate­gi­cal­ly lo­cat­ed ar­eas where Grif­fith feels they’ll play a big part to­wards elec­tion re­sults.

The NTA will an­nounce three new can­di­dates to­day—two of whom re­cent­ly re­signed from the UNC. He added more peo­ple from oth­er par­ties have shown in­ter­est in join­ing NTA.

Grif­fith frowned on what he deemed the Op­po­si­tion Leader’s “triv­i­al­is­ing” of de­par­tures from the UNC. He said those who left rep­re­sent “tens of thou­sands with sim­i­lar views.”

To­day’s me­dia con­fer­ence will be joint­ly held with rep­re­sen­ta­tives from HOPE and CRN.

Duke’s PDP ready

Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) leader Wat­son Duke, who’s con­test­ing To­ba­go East, yes­ter­day said, “We al­so have a pow­er­ful To­ba­go West can­di­date who’ll be named af­ter the elec­tion date’s giv­en. We’re cam­paign­ing and can­vass­ing. The TPP has no re­al sup­port base—what they have are in­di­vid­u­als mere­ly seek­ing to trans­act their per­son­al busi­ness.

“In con­trast, the PDP has a proven track record of elec­toral suc­cess dat­ing back to 2015, cul­mi­nat­ing in a de­ci­sive vic­to­ry in De­cem­ber 2021, se­cur­ing 14 seats against the PNM’s one. The TPP is a par­ty built on de­cep­tion, lack­ing se­ri­ous can­di­dates gen­uine­ly com­mit­ted to ad­vanc­ing To­bag­o­ni­ans’ in­ter­ests. Their sole fo­cus is self-en­rich­ment and self-ag­gran­dis­e­ment. They’ve nev­er won an elec­tion and have no ca­pac­i­ty to do so.”

Al­so con­tact­ed, IDA leader Denise Tsoiafatt An­gus said, “IDA is pre­pared for any even­tu­al­i­ty. Our se­lec­tion process is in its fi­nal stages, en­sur­ing our can­di­dates are cho­sen based on broad com­mu­ni­ty sup­port, not just in­ter­nal par­ty de­ci­sions. While we haven’t yet of­fi­cial­ly an­nounced can­di­dates, we’ll be ready when the time comes.”

She added, “IDA will not align with any na­tion­al par­ty, ei­ther be­fore or af­ter the elec­tion, to take up any gov­ern­ment po­si­tions. Un­like oth­ers who seek cab­i­net po­si­tions, our rep­re­sen­ta­tives will re­main in­de­pen­dent, en­sur­ing that To­ba­go has a re­al and un­fet­tered voice in Par­lia­ment where they act as a swing vote on cru­cial leg­is­la­tion in pro­tec­tion of the is­land and coun­try.”