Is COP part of the Warner change?

An email circulating on a UNC chat group Thursday pointed out that Ram and Jack equals Win. If you join the dots you'll see a picture emerging of unity involving the so-called UNC dissidents Ramesh L. Maharaj and Jack Warner and the leader of the Congress of the People (COP), Winston Dookeran.

The new acronym is RAMJACKWIN.

It's the first clear signal that Warner and Maharaj are close to some kind of alliance with the COP, which has consistently made it clear that while it supports unity among the opposition groups in Trinidad & Tobago, it would not be part of any political coalition that involves former Prime Minister and UNC Leader, Basdeo Panday.

Warner and Maharaj have been leading a campaign for change in the UNC for which they have been branded dissidents and "neemakharams". On Wednesday the group addressed supporters at a meeting in Panday's Couva North Constituency in which Warner praised Panday and made it clear he holds no grudge against his leader or any other member of the UNC.

However he was adamant that without the kind of radical change he is advocating the UNC would not reach its goal of winning government. And he pledged that nothing would stop his mission.

"I have no fight with anybody within the UNC, but I do have a war to win against Patrick Manning...and I will not rest nor stay quiet until I achieve that", he said.

He told the meeting opposition unity is vital to reach that goal, suggesting that the party cannot "go on condemning COP and its supporters calling them CORPSE in the night and hoping to embrace them in the day!"

Read the story: Warner won't abandon struggle for change in the UNC
Watch Jack Warner's speech on YOUTUBE

There was no mention of any merger or alignment with COP and no talk of Dookeran. But Warner, who successfully ran for the post of UNC deputy leader on Dookeran's slate in the UNC's internal election, has always been a strong advocate for unity.

Although he walked away from Dookeran - who quit as UNC leader and formed COP - and embraced Panday, he never abandoned his unity plan. In fact it was he who was the leading force behind the UNC Alliance that won 15 seats in the November 5, 2007 General Election that returned the People's National Movement (PNM) to office with a strong majority of 26 seats.

In fact in his speech Wednesday night in central Trinidad he was clear that he is not discarding the A from the UNC. He spoke of a need to create "a movement that can unite and excite all peoples of our country and create a place where every creed and race can truly find an equal place."

There is good reason to believe that a COP alliance with Warner and Maharaj is viable. The UNC is today a poor shadow of the powerful movement that Panday launched 20 years ago with a prediction that people would join "not because of the colour of their skins, but the content of their minds."

When Panday anointed Dookeran to be the unchallenged leader of the UNC there was hope that vital change was imminent but Dookeran eventually left the party, claiming that obstructionist elements within the UNC made it impossible for him to lead.

Whatever the reality, it was clear that Dookeran and his new COP appealed to a large constituency of disenchanted UNC supporters, a reality that might have deprived the UNC Alliance of victory. More than 148,000 voters cast ballots for the COP although it didn't win a seat. What is more significant is that nearly 100,000 of those votes were cast for the UNC in the previous election in 2002.

With Warner and Maharaj making charges similar to those that caused Dookeran to walk away it is easy to understand why an alliance is very likely.

The UNC constituency that Panday commands is rapidly diminishing. And the younger, upwardly mobile UNC members and disenchanted PNM supporters are likely to support a political movement that offers what Warner says is a rejection of "old dictatorial ways" for a new path "to include all in discussions as we build a Party that is truly a national representation."

Panday has often said that a party is something that you build over time through leadership and struggle and it cannot be handed over to someone or some entity. He is right. He has also said the people are the ones who determine their leadership and their destiny.

Warner et al are counting on that same idea as they demand change and a new way of doing politics.

If they have COP on their side, they might already have a mass movement that can challenge the old guard UNC and offer new hope for those who oppose the PNM in the same way that Panday and his allies rallied the forces in 1976 with the United Labour Front (ULF) and swept away the tired, irrelevant Democratic Labour Party.

Jai Parasram - Toronto | April 10, 2009