Camille McEach­nie

For the sec­ond con­sec­u­tive Gen­er­al Elec­tion, the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) won the two To­ba­go seats - East and West.

Re­sults be­gan pour­ing in slow­ly and steadi­ly af­ter vot­ing end­ed at 6 pm and by 10.30 pm it was clear the PNM had swept the two seats again.

It meant the PNM’s in­cum­bents Ayan­na Web­ster-Roy and Sham­fa Cud­joe had staved off the at­tacks of the Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) - its clos­est ri­val.

The PNM fought hard to con­vince vot­ers that the PNM was “the right choice” while the PDP’s Wat­son Duke and Tashia Grace Bur­ris as­sured vot­ers the PDP would put “peo­ple be­fore pol­i­tics.”

In the end, the elec­torate chose the in­cum­bents.

Com­ment­ing on her win af­ter de­clar­ing the seat, Cud­joe said: “The peo­ple of To­ba­go West would have spo­ken. They would have stood up for no-non­sense. They would have had their voic­es heard.”

Con­grat­u­lat­ing Web­ster-Roy and Cud­joe, PNM’s To­ba­go Coun­cil leader Tra­cy David­son-Ce­les­tine said she was pleased with the re­sults. She said: “If it were the THA elec­tions, the PNM would have tak­en 11 of the 12 seats.”

Duke con­ced­ed de­feat quick­ly. How­ev­er, he told his sup­port­ers the jour­ney had just be­gun and they should now pre­pare for the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly elec­tions con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly due by Jan­u­ary 2021.

PNM Tobago East winner Ayanna Webster-Roy after voting yesterday.

Casandra Thompson-Forbes

Ac­cord­ing to the EBC, 23,103 peo­ple were el­i­gi­ble to vote in the east and 27,686 in the west.

The day’s pro­ceed­ings, which be­gan at 6 am across the coun­try, saw the Elec­tion and Bound­aries (EBC) set up polling sta­tions equipped with the usu­al sta­tion per­son­nel and an ad­di­tion­al san­i­ta­tion clerk, in keep­ing with rules and reg­u­la­tions to pre­vent the spread of COVID-19. Po­lice kept a watch­ful eye, re­mind­ing vot­ers to so­cial dis­tance, sani­tise and wear masks in and around the polling sta­tions.

Ac­cord­ing to Cud­joe, vot­er turnout was steady and there were many first-time vot­ers in many elec­toral dis­tricts.

The PDP’s Bur­ris said for the most part, the vot­ing process went “smooth­ly” for PDP sup­port­ers.

Al­so among those who al­so con­test­ed the two seats in To­ba­go were One To­ba­go Voice’s (OTV) Ju­liana Hen­ry-King, Uni­ty of the Peo­ple’s Nick­o­cy Phillips and in­de­pen­dent can­di­date Ri­car­do Phillip. These can­di­dates’ meet­ings and Face­book posts did not at­tract as many sup­port­ers as the PNM and PDP and it showed at the polls yes­ter­day.

The OTV is a coali­tion of the To­ba­go For­wards, led by Christlyn Moore, To­ba­go Or­gan­i­sa­tion of the Peo­ple, led by Ash­worth Jack and The Plat­form of Truth head­ed by Ho­choy Charles.