How to win an election, or lose one

I don't know Steve Alvarez and have had no contact with him but if comments attributed to him in Irene Medina's Newsday story on August 7, 2007 are true I would say he's either ducking a significant political issue or naïve about the business that he is getting into.

Medina's story quotes Alvarez as saying that the UNC Alliance will not choose a leader until after the general election because "we don't want the media to focus on one person." Alavarez and anybody who shares that view are missing the whole point.

And that's what's wrong with the politics in Trinidad and Tobago today. Patrick Manning and his PNM administration have created every opportunity for a strong opposition to unseat his regime.

Just look at the mayhem that plagues the society with the government showing scant attention to public safety or the irresponsible squandering of the country's resources. But the point is not to dwell on Manning's misdeeds; it's how to deal with the problems he has created.

Ask people everywhere in Trinidad and Tobago and they will tell you it's time for the PNM to go. Even some PNM supporters are fed up and ready to change the guard, if not the party. But almost in the same breadth you will hear another familiar line: "who we go put?" And that's what Alvarez is missing.

I refuse to believe he's that naïve. In a previous column I wrote about the mistakes the Alliance (ULF, DAC and TAPIA) made in 1981. Selwyn Ryan and other political commentators have written extensively about the confused electorate that returned the PNM to office in 1981.

They were confused because Basdeo Panday, Lloyd Best and A.N.R. Robinson made the same mistake Alvarez is making today. By ducking the question of leadership the UNC Alliance is demonstrating a clear lack of confidence in its electoral chances.

Or perhaps it is just frightened to deal with the reality. Basdeo Panday is the defacto leader of the UNC Alliance. Alvarez and his colleagues are frightened to challenge that because they lack a constituency. Panday is the only one among them who has one. It's the same one he has had since he entered politics forty years ago: the dispossessed and disadvantaged masses.

Today PNM propaganda has put a tremendous amount of unsavoury baggage on the man who presided over the most effective government the nation has ever known. And it is popular these days to engage in Panday-bashing, which is getting to be some kind of new national sport. Yet his commanding political presence makes it difficult for anyone to challenge him.

And that's where the UNC Alliance is missing the boat. You cannot tell people you lack the confidence to decide who among you can lead the party to victory and take over the government. If you can't do that, why should anybody vote for you?

That was the issue in 1981. People voted for the ULF and the DAC, not the Alliance. That year, the other parties at least had some kind of track record and identities.

No non-UNC component in the UNC Alliance has demonstrated it can command support to even win a seat on its own anywhere in the country; the UNC remains the only credible element in the group.

And that brings back the dilemma facing the UNC Alliance. They want to push Panday out because they feel – perhaps with good reason – that the baggage he now carries will be devastating. As each "leader" jockeys for position he sees the faint light at the end of the tunnel leading to Whitehall. So why rock the boat now and put out that light?

Each knows he cannot face the electorate as a leader and win. So, instead of dealing with the problem, they hide behind useless rhetoric such as the comment attributed to Alvarez.

A voter has every right to care about the media focus in an election campaign, especially one so crucial as the election at hand. And the media have every right to focus on a leader. A responsible political party has an obligation to get its act together, determine who is its leader, create a platform for change and then convince the people that it presents the best hope to fix the damage done over the past six years of PNM misrule.

The media report the news. That's their role and responsibility in a democracy. When they focus on a leader of a party, they focus on the person who will likely be the next prime minister. They have every right to focus on the leader, so it's absolute nonsense for any politician to even suggest that the reason for not selecting a leader now is because the UNC Alliance doesn't want the media to focus on one person.

Trinidad and Tobago is in a political crisis. Time is running out and the people are still holding hope that they will find the alternative they so desperately need. There is still time. Perhaps the UNC Alliance should look beyond the narrow view of the current "leaders".

I live in Toronto, so I don't have a vote in this election. But in the present circumstances, that's a good thing because it spares me the dilemma of deciding who gets that vote. Unfortunately, the tens of thousands who want to vote remain confused because of the indecision and grandstanding.

But if I did have a vote, here's how I would like to "invest" it.

Give me a strong, united opposition party. The UNC, its alliance members and the COP all have people with talent and commitment to the national good. Each group has valid and useful programmes to rescue the nation.

Bring the ideas together, bring the people together and decide on a leader. If people still have a problem with Basdeo Panday, give Jack Warner the task of leading the nation out of its current misery.

I would vote for that. And I can guarantee that the majority of the electorate will.

Jai Parasram - Toronto, August 2007