The Congress of the People (COP) has selected five more candidates for the September 7 polls but has still not finalised any arrangement with the United National Congress as to which seats it would contest.
Deputy political leaders of the Congress of the People, Anirudh Mahabir and Lorraine Pouchet yesterday presented the five candidates at the party’s Port-of-Spain office during a news conference.
The COP is a member unit in the People’s Partnership Government.
Mahabir said negotiations between the member units of the partnership were still taking place but the COP expected to contest the six seats it now controlled and possibly more.
The seats named yesterday were not among the six it won in the 2010 election.
In 2010, COP won six seats: Arima (Rodger Samuel); D’Abadie/O’Meara (Anil Roberts); Lopinot/Bon Air West (Lincoln Douglas); San Fernando West (Carolyn Seepersad-Bachan); St Augustine (Prakash Ramadhar) and Tunapuna (Winston Dookeran).
Both Dookeran, the founder of the party, and Seepersad-Bachan, a one-time political leader candidate, have bowed out of the election race.
Earlier this month, the party announced that its political leader, Prakash Ramadhar announced that Arts and Multiculturalism Minister Lincoln Douglas, Diversity Minister Rodger Samuel and Ramadhar himself would be contesting seats in Lopinot/Bon Air West, Arima and St Augustine.
Former Arima deputy mayor, Patricia Cedeno-Metivier, was announced as a candidate to contest the D’Abadie/O’Meara constituency, once held by former sport minister Anil Roberts.
Ramadhar had signalled that the party wanted to contest at least 13 seats.
Mahabir said yesterday that the talks with the main coalition partner were “going well.”
He said: “We want to get (contest) as many seats as we can.”
Among the prospective candidates is former temporary Senator Ashaki Scott. She was selected to contest San Fernando East seat, which has always been controlled by the PNM.
The other four candidates named were former 1990 attempted coup hostage Wendell Eversley to contest Arouca/Maloney; Avonelle Hector-Joseph for Diego Martin West; former Port-of-Spain councillor Cleveland Garcia for Port-of-Spain South and radio talk show host Garth Christopher for Laventille East/Morvant.
If selected, Hector-Joseph, the daughter of former Diego Martin West MP Margaret Hector, will go up against the political leader of the People’s National Movement Dr Keith Rowley. The UNC has also announced Garvin Nicholas as its candidate for the seat.
She said she had no personal vendetta against anyone but just want to do what she can to improve the quality of life for the people of Diego Martin West, who have been neglected over the past decades.
She said if she was chosen to contest the seat, her battle would be similar to the Bible story of David and Goliath.
She is the founder of Is There Not A Cause, which assists people in securing some of the basic needs in T&T and other countries in the Caribbean and Africa.
She said that group was non-political. “There is a place for activism but when you want to get into real change some of us have to put ourselves in a place where the policies and decisions are being made,” she added.
Scott said she believed she “could bring that freshness to San Fernando East.”
She said constituents of San Fernando East felt they have been under-represented over the past years.
Eversley said if he was chosen as the candidate and he won the seat he would not want to be a minister but a MP to serve the people.