LGE on Tobago’s mind

The THA was dissolved one week ago to make way for the elections which Chief Secretary Orville London said will be held between January 11 and February 11, 2017. Though he gave no date, London said he is expected to meet with both President Anthony Carmona and Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley after which the exact date of the election will be announced.

Three of the island’s political entities have to date confirmed their participation in the race which will bring a new Chief Secretary to the Assembly dependent on whichever party wins the most number of seats. Leader of the Progressive Democratic Patriots (PDP), Watson Duke has themed his campaign, ‘Rumble in the Jungle.’ “There is a massive launch at Speyside on Saturday (yesterday) and next week, we would head to Bethel to launch our Bethel/ Mt Irvine candidate. The PDP intends to launch our candidates going forward in grand, fine style because we consider our candidates to be among Tobago’s finest and so coming forth there would be a new breed of candidates that will create a new dispensation of Governance within the Tobago House of Assembly for the Tobago People,” he said.

To date, the PDP has announced five of its candidates. Chairman of the Tobago Forwards Hewlett Waldron said 15 nominees were screened and it was no easy task.

“It was not as easy. We have selected our candidates and are gearing up for the elections, we have a variation of candidates young, old, grassroots, all levels so we made sure that we selected the right candidates for the right purpose. All the candidates are expected to be introduced on Sunday (today) at the Tobago Forwards Office in Scarborough.

We have the strongest team of all but we are not about show business, we are about serious business, we are strategic, settled and organised,” he said.

The Tobago Forwards has announced four candidates to date.

Meanwhile, the People’s National Movement (PNM) Tobago Council chairman Stanford Callender said 23 persons have filed nomination papers and are expected to be screened in the upcoming week.

“Our nomination exercise ended on Tuesday 8th November and in total we have 23 nominees for the 12 electoral districts that are to be contested in Tobago. The exercise went smoothly and the next stage of that critical exercise is the screening of those 23 nominees to determine who represents the PNM in each of the 12 electoral districts,” he said.