DARREN PRASHAD
THE UNITED National Congress has played a great role since its formation in 1988 (first as Club '88) in strengthening democracy in Trinidad and Tobago and giving representation to marginalised and alienated nationals. But since 2015, it has declined in importance because of leadership flaws and reluctance of the leader to accept responsibility for repeated defeats.
The UNC has become the weakest opposition since the 'No Vote' produced no official opposition between 1971 and 1976. The present opposition, in fact, is compared to a non-opposition in Parliament. Leadership is severely jeopardising the UNC's political prospects.
The UNC and the opposition are largely leadership-less. The minor parties and Phillip Alexander, Gary Griffith and Watson Duke are far more effective than the UNC and its leader. There is an official opposition leader, but she is ineffective and should have hung up her holster a long time ago, right after the massive defeat in the 2015 election, taking the party downwards from 29 seats in 2010 to 18 seats.
Kamla Persad-Bissessar should have taken responsibility for the party's devastating electoral outcome in the 2015 and 2020 general elections as well as several local government elections and leave politics.
In the Westminster parliamentary tradition, a leader who loses a general election resigns. In Trinidad, the UNC leader lost two general elections and several local government elections. Yet she renewed her leadership in internal elections earlier this year and announced her intention to lead the party into the 2025 election.
Persad-Bissessar's continued leadership of the UNC will result in resounding defeats. The political leader fails to recognise that 'kamlamania' birthed in 2010 had eroded long before her defeat in 2015 because of failed policies and an inability to hold together her coalition of then opposition parties in 2010; the sheen and shine were long gone by 2015, with defeat staring the party in the face.
For the 2020 election, although advised by political pundits and senior MPs (like Fuad Khan, Fazal Karim and Bhoe Tewarie) within her party to reconcile her differences with other opposition parties and prominent figures (like Basdeo Panday, Jack Warner, Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj, etc) estranged from the UNC, she would have none of it, taking the party to another defeat.
The 2015 and 2020 selection of UNC candidates for the general elections is a lesson in how not to choose candidates. She learned nothing from the 2015 disaster and repeated same in 2020. The 2020 selectees in particular is a lesson in who not to choose - some of the most discredited and disliked people. One of them has a long history of doing anything to get a 'safe seat' but could not hold it in a local election. Some of them are like children with no history of achievements or grassroots activism.
Had the UNC united the base and brought back stalwarts (like Panday, Maharaj, Trevor Sudama, John Humphrey, Warner, and so many others) who were alienated and marginalised be
