Sending a message

TRINIDAD and Tobago are not always on the same page. That was not the case on Monday night. In both islands, voters appeared to vent frustration with the Government or to be signalling apathy. Confirmation of final tallies and turnouts notwithstanding, the electorate delivered a wake-up call.

Political pundits will parse the results of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) election and the local government by-elections in the coming days, weeks and months. Many factors will be used to explain away the dead heat in the assembly and the Opposition’s successful wresting of the Arima Central seat from the incumbents.

Still, the ruling People’s National Movement cannot deny the outcomes in both islands are a far cry from the unabashed endorsement it had hoped for.

In Tobago, the Prime Minister campaigned personally – making multiple platform appearances and starring in a motorcade on the eve of Monday’s poll. Having thus courted the idea of the election as a referendum on him, it is hard not to see the result as such.

However, history will consider the unusual circumstances in which these elections were held, since they took place amid a pandemic.

Additionally, this country only a few months ago had a general election. At that poll, very few concessions were made to the pandemic besides the most rudimentary of measures. If “covid19 fatigue” is real, so too is election fatigue – even if elections are vital to our interests.

In this case, complacency may well have also been another factor. Opinion polls had suggested a clear PNM lead in Tobago over the Progressive Democratic Patriots (PDP).

A low voter turnout generally favours the incumbent. Which makes the PDP’s inroads all the more notable. The party of Watson Duke and Farley Augustine has bucked the trend of Tobago opposition parties fading. Not only have they remained relevant, they did so despite an intervening general election loss.

Early evidence suggests Monday’s turnout was low. The voter turnout in the last three THA elections before Monday had been 49.7 per cent, 70.1 per cent and 56.4 per cent respectively, and it seems unlikely such figures will be replicated.

Turnout in local government elections tend to be low, by-elections lower, though they are opportunities to deliver a mid-term report card on the government of the day.

In Tobago, the eruption, at the eleventh hour, of corruption scandals, a zipline tiff, rhetoric over vagrants and questions over a $300 million bond signed suspiciously close to the poll may have both energised and dismayed voters.

Ironically, the hung THA result suggests the most important issue was the one we heard least about: THA reform. The people of Tobago, through this outcome, may now force the legislative change they have been denied for so long.