POLITICAL analyst Dr Bishnu Ragoonath said the PNM had sought to send a clear message that Tobago was better off sticking with it, but with a chance of some recent initiatives backfiring in Monday's Tobago House of Assembly (THA) elections. He spoke to Newsday on Monday just before the 6 pm close of polls.

Ragoonath said the PNM's message had been that people's jobs at the THA were safe under the PNM, the island's economy did very well under the PNM with an expenditure of $2 billion compared to earnings of $200 million, and that the PNM would keep Tobago in a unitary state while the PDP promoted secession.

Yet issues around the campaign could backfire on the PNM, he said.

Ragoonath said the PNM had run a nightly televised "air campaign."

"It carried the message not only in Tobago but also in Trinidad.

"The PDP did not have the resources to pay for that kind of campaign. To that extent I have seen where millions of dollars have been suggested as having been spent by the PNM in this campaign to cover this air campaign."

He said while PNM meetings had stated their policies, the air campaign sought to discredit the PDP's leadership of Farley Augustus and Watson Duke as an alternative government of the THA, saying the PNM has successfully used such attacks in Trinidad against UNC leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar.

"Negative campaigning has been used a lot in the US. It is something now being used by this new advertising agency the PNM is using. Whether it will pay dividends, we'll have to see."

Ragoonath said, up to Monday, from 2001-2021 voter turnout was usually under 60 per cent with all elections won by the PNM.

Yet in 2013, when turnout exceeded 70 per cent, the PNM won all 12 seats.

"Voter turnout cannot be used as a metric as to how Tobago will vote."

Noting a jump in PDP seats in THA elections from two in 2017 to six in January 2021, Ragoonath said other metrics must be considered, amid lessons from the January election.

"Something had changed significantly. We have to now look and see whether there is a change in the mindset of the Tobago electorate and what would have been the factors."

He said Trinidad cannot be used as a comparator. as Tobagonians have a different mindset to Trinidadians.

"In the January election. one of the things that came to the fore were allegations of corruption within the PNM-led THA. Those allegations have not necessarily gone away. That I think is one of the real issues that would have led some Tobagonians to vote against the PNM.

"If you looked at the 2020 general election and the January 2021 THA election, the voting population remained largely the same. but we had a different kind of result."

He attributed this to many Tobago voters heeding the PDP's allegation of PNM corruption, saying this could affect Monday's outcome.

"The second issue which came up in the January election was how the PNM treated their own and their opponents. There was the concern about how the former chief secretary (Kelvin Charles) was treated by the PNM and how Dr