Coalition team working on policies

KINNESHA GEORGE-HARRY

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of three po­lit­i­cal par­ties in To­ba­go –The Plat­form of Truth (TPT), To­ba­go For­wards (TF), and To­ba­go Or­gan­i­sa­tion of the Peo­ple (TOP) – have been meeting quietly in the background and are expected to host another public event shortly.

In May, the three leaders – Christlyn Moore (TF), Ho­choy Charles (TPT) and Ash­worth Jack (TOP) – first met with their followers to de­ter­mine if one new po­lit­i­cal en­ti­ty should be formed un­der the theme “One Voice” and were given the man­date to cre­ate one po­lit­i­cal team.

Speaking with Newsday on Tuesday, a close associate of the group, who spoke on condition of anonymity, reported: “We have been meeting working out the policies, etc. I really can’t go into too much detail at this time, but we have been meeting silently in the background, working out all the logistics before we present anything concrete to the public.

“We have one more meeting scheduled to complete what we would have started, and at that meeting we would plan the next public engagement – and that, I can guarantee you, would be soon.”

During the May meeting, the small gathering called on the three leaders to “mend any fracture” among the parties over the years, with Charles saying the group’s aim was "not to im­me­di­ate­ly con­test elec­tions but to unite, use the con­sti­tu­tion to gain more au­ton­o­my for To­ba­go and fix neg­a­tive chal­lenges af­fect­ing To­ba­go.”

He said the struc­ture means collectively they will de­ter­mine the entity that should be formed to speak as one “to gain lib­er­a­tion for To­ba­go, and a bet­ter sys­tem of gov­ern­ment of To­ba­go with­in the coun­try.”

As a team, the group has no official name, sym­bol, struc­ture or con­sti­tu­tion, as yet, and cur­rent­ly re­fers to itself as the To­ba­go Lib­er­a­tion and Em­pow­er­ment Team.

Its first meet­ing was held on March 17 and was at­tend­ed by 70 of the 85 in­vit­ed mem­bers. Since then, it has held "community engagements" in areas including Roxborough, Moriah, Plymouth and Canaan/Bon Accord.