Pardy earns Machel 11th Road March win

Machel Montano clinched his 11th Road March with his 2025 single Pardy and has tied with the late Grandmaster Kitchener as having the most Road March wins.

The Trinbago Unified Calypsonians’ Organisation (TUCO) announced Montano’s win on Wednesday.

His popular song Pardy was played 267 times as opposed to Bunji Garlin’s Carry It, which played 253 times. The results were announced on March 5 at the Queen’s Park Savannah, Port of Spain.

Garlin also placed third with his Thousands being played 22 times.

TUCO also provided a more detailed list of the songs played at the judging points, showing the top 11 songs played on the road. Fay Ann Lyons-Alvarez’s Road Meeting was among them, having been played 11 times at those points.

In a statement on Wednesday, Montano said it was a dream come true and “quite surreal” to share having 11 Road March titles with Kitchener.

He added that he was grateful to his entire team who worked on the project and the fans who brought the song to life.

“To the masqueraders, I say thank you and I want this to be a message to all the hard-working people out there…once you put in the work, you deserve a Pardy!

“Never let anyone say you’re too young, too old, too good or not deserving of your blessings. Everyone deserves a Pardy!!”

TUCO’s president Ainsley King said the system of tabulating the Road March was fair. His statement came after a social media video in which Lyons-Alvarez questioned a statement made by a Road March tabulator in San Fernando. The tabulator was relieved of her duty after this incident.

King said yesterday, “There was a breach in our code of conduct. We have dealt with that. It was surprising for us. We sincerely apologise for the development.

“We are going to put things in place to make sure that that does not reoccur.”

He said the tabulators were briefed and asked what else the organisation could do.

“They received a brief and that still took place. We just have to make sure we have the right people,” he added.

Asked if the tabulator’s conduct was overzealous or caused by excitement, King said it could have been but he did not wish to speculate on what she was thinking.

The process of choosing the Road March winner was very fair, King said.

“Road March is just tabulation. They just count the amount of plays. That is a very simple process and straight forward.

“Where the Road March is concerned, I can declare, everything was clear. There is nothing like any 'mafia' in the Road March.

"I don’t think anyone would take a chance like that. Anyone would come and put people in the different points and count.

“We do not intend to compromise ourselves like that,” he said.

Earlier, Lyons-Alvarez posted to social media responding to the video of the tabulator.

In her video, Lyons-Alvarez said, “In light of what we’ve just seen on Beyoncé and Elon Musk’s Internet, we have decided that the competition sector is no longer something that’s attractive to us.

"The integrity, the way things are being done, the people that they are putting to do the things that they have to do is very uncomfortable and unsettling to us. So, in light of that, we have decided to step away.

"And I do hope that you all do better, cause y’all have younger artistes coming up, and if y’all really care about culture, then the manner in which you present the culture moving forward should be of the utmost importance, and discipline is a big part of it, as well as transparency, accountability, honesty and, most important, integrity which seems to be in a deficit right now.”

She thanked the fans for their support of Carry It and Road Meeting.

In a March 5 release, TUCO said the Road March was determined by statistics and the personal opinions of the tabulator held no weight in the final decision.

Montano won $250,000 and a bmobile package as the competition's title sponsor.