Political analyst: PNM THA election strategy was risky

POLITICAL analyst Dr Bishnu Ragoonath said the PNM had sought to send a clear message that Tobago was better off sticking with it, but with a chance of some recent initiatives backfiring in Monday's Tobago House of Assembly (THA) elections. He spoke to Newsday on Monday just before the 6 pm close of polls.

Ragoonath said the PNM's message had been that people's jobs at the THA were safe under the PNM, the island's economy did very well under the PNM with an expenditure of $2 billion compared to earnings of $200 million, and that the PNM would keep Tobago in a unitary state while the PDP promoted secession.

Yet issues around the campaign could backfire on the PNM, he said.

Ragoonath said the PNM had run a nightly televised "air campaign."

"It carried the message not only in Tobago but also in Trinidad.

"The PDP did not have the resources to pay for that kind of campaign. To that extent I have seen where millions of dollars have been suggested as having been spent by the PNM in this campaign to cover this air campaign."

He said while PNM meetings had stated their policies, the air campaign sought to discredit the PDP's leadership of Farley Augustus and Watson Duke as an alternative government of the THA, saying the PNM has successfully used such attacks in Trinidad against UNC leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar.

"Negative campaigning has been used a lot in the US. It is something now being used by this new advertising agency the PNM is using. Whether it will pay dividends, we'll have to see."

Ragoonath said, up to Monday, from 2001-2021 voter turnout was usually under 60 per cent with all elections won by the PNM.

Yet in 2013, when turnout exceeded 70 per cent, the PNM won all 12 seats.

"Voter turnout cannot be used as a metric as to how Tobago will vote."

Noting a jump in PDP seats in THA elections from two in 2017 to six in January 2021, Ragoonath said other metrics must be considered, amid lessons from the January election.

"Something had changed significantly. We have to now look and see whether there is a change in the mindset of the Tobago electorate and what would have been the factors."

He said Trinidad cannot be used as a comparator. as Tobagonians have a different mindset to Trinidadians.

"In the January election. one of the things that came to the fore were allegations of corruption within the PNM-led THA. Those allegations have not necessarily gone away. That I think is one of the real issues that would have led some Tobagonians to vote against the PNM.

"If you looked at the 2020 general election and the January 2021 THA election, the voting population remained largely the same. but we had a different kind of result."

He attributed this to many Tobago voters heeding the PDP's allegation of PNM corruption, saying this could affect Monday's outcome.

"The second issue which came up in the January election was how the PNM treated their own and their opponents. There was the concern about how the former chief secretary (Kelvin Charles) was treated by the PNM and how Dr Denise Tsoiafatt-Angus was treated by the PNM." (Dr Tsoiafatt-Angus quit as THA presiding officer to contest the PNM Tobago Island Council leadership. but stood down to support Tracy Davidson-Celestine. However, Tsoiafatt-Angus was then rejected as a candidate for Scarborough/Calder Hall last January, stood as an independent and was then expelled from the PNM for breaching the party's constitution.)

Ragoonath also thought Monday's elections might be affected by the Tobago PNM's intransigence in the face of the PDP's offer to give it the post of chief secretary, only for Davidson-Celestine to wish also to name the THA secretaries. Such an episode could have voters question the Tobago PNM's ethics and integrity, Ragoonath said.

He said redrawing the boundaries to create three new seats in areas held by the PNM could be seen as the PNM's stacking the election in its favour. (Even though the exercise was done by the EBC, the THA (Amendment) Bill was passed in Parliament by the Government to create new seats, as opposed to other ways to break the six-six tie. such as by flipping a coin.)

Ragoonath questioned the Prime Minister's media briefing last Friday ahead of the THA election as a possible abuse of state resources. He also questioned the timing of the recent $50 million allocation to Tobago (to help hoteliers and unemployed individuals), although it might be needed, plus the very recent distribution of Self Help Commission grants.

Newsday asked how Tobagonians' pride in Dr Rowley as a Tobago-born prime minister would compare to possible resentment of outside influence in the island by a national PNM.

Ragoonath said former president and former prime minister ANR Robinson was considered more of an "ah we boy" than Rowley, who had left Tobago, become Diego Martin West MP and whose link to the island was now mainly in enterprise ventures involving a farm and townhouses.

Asked the impact of the national PNM on Tobago elections, Ragoonath admitted to the possibility of more than one election mindset in Tobago. He said west Tobago was more urban and populated by most THA workers and more pro-PNM, while east Tobago was more rural and traditionally against the PNM.