BACK IN TIME POLITICS

Tobago’s politics has stepped backward in time to pre-1956 days in the run-up to the January 17 elections for the Tobago House of Assembly with the cross over of high profile members of the ruling People’s National Movement (PNM) and the Opposition National  Alliance for Reconstruction (NAR) to the Democratic Action Congress (DAC). The situation has been reminiscent of 1946 and 1950 when political parties and/or alliances were formed principally for the purpose of fighting elections, and persons “jumped ship” if they thought that another party had a better chance of winning at the polls. Recent political shifts in Tobago have embraced sitting members of the THA and gone all the way to the summit with the Secretary of Agriculture/Marine Affairs in the Tobago House of Assembly, PNM Assemblyman, Hughford McKenna, joining the DAC.

McKenna’s appearance on a DAC platform wearing a DAC jersey at the party’s launch on Sunday shocked many and brought a swift and not unexpected reaction from THA Chief Secretary, Orville London. Of interest was McKenna’s announcement that he was not contesting the Assembly elections. This does not rule him out, however, of an appointment to the THA’s virtual Cabinet as a Secretary should the DAC confound observers and win on January 17. Within 24 hours of McKenna’s public embrace of the DAC, THA Chief Secretary London announced that he had advised President George Maxwell Richards to revoke McKenna’s appointment as Secretary of Agriculture. But as remarkable as McKenna’s crossing over was perhaps the most unusual was that of the Political Leader of the NAR Tobago, Cecil Caruth. Caruth, who was among the first to make the quantum leap to the DAC, had been involved in negotiations with Congress on a political accommodation. He has since been chosen to contest the elections on the DAC slate as the candidate for the Roxborough/Delaford constituency.

The Political Leader of the DAC, Hochoy Charles, had at one time been political leader of the NAR and later had broken away from it to reform the Democratic Action Congress which had been dissolved almost 20 years ago with the creation of the National Alliance for Reconstruction. The political shifting around in the run-up to the 1946 and 1950 Trinidad and Tobago elections had seen the formation of several parties, with politicians leaving one party to join another and some leaving the second to join a third, very often depending on the perceived fortunes of the group(s). Sometimes, individuals made the switch if it meant being selected to fight the elections, and while this may not necessarily be applicable to today’s crossing over, what identifies Tobago’s politics with that of the national politics more than 50 years ago has been the confusion it has created in the minds of disinterested persons. Politics, it has been said, is the art of the possible.

While the existence of three political parties jostling for the 12 seats in the Tobago House of Assembly was certain to create a degree of confusion in the minds of voters, the shifting of allegiances virtually on the eve of elections, particularly by the political leader of one party and a House of Assembly office holder in another, may have further compounded it. The tacit reverting to the politics of yesteryear, which many had hoped had ended in 1956 with the introduction of party politics in Trinidad and Tobago, and this virtually on the eve of Christmas can hardly be considered as a suitable Christmas gift to the Tobago electorate.