Duke mum on PDP’s plans for THA election

Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

Se­nior Re­porter

eliz­a­beth.gon­za­[email protected]

Pro­gres­sive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Pa­tri­ots (PDP) leader Wat­son Duke yes­ter­day stayed mum on his par­ty’s plans for Jan­u­ary 12 THA elec­tion, and two po­lit­i­cal an­a­lysts be­lieve his ac­tion may sig­nal the end of his decade-long po­lit­i­cal ca­reer.

Duke has bare­ly said a word since his de­feat in the April 28 Gen­er­al Elec­tion, and even more so af­ter Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­vealed that he had asked her for a job.

Con­tact­ed by Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day for a com­ment on his par­ty’s fu­ture af­ter Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine an­nounced the elec­tion date on Mon­day night, Duke de­clined to com­ment, say­ing he will “break his si­lence when he is ready and when the time is right.”

But weeks be­fore, he told Guardian Me­dia he was ready­ing his par­ty and in­ti­mate­ly se­lect­ing his can­di­dates in his quest to re­gain pow­er af­ter a fall­out be­tween him­self and Far­ley Au­gus­tine in 2022 led to the lat­ter break­ing ranks with the PDP and form­ing the To­ba­go Peo­ple’s Par­ty.

Yes­ter­day, po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Bish­nu Ra­goonath said he be­lieves Duke may be re­con­sid­er­ing whether to con­test this year’s THA elec­tion at all. He said Duke could be weigh­ing the pos­si­bil­i­ty of an­oth­er loss af­ter the PDP’s heavy de­cline in vot­er sup­port.

“He may think it is not wor­thy for him to put him­self up where he could be de­feat­ed,” Dr Ra­goonath said.

“Any politi­cian is go­ing in­to that bat­tle with the be­lief that they will win. If, how­ev­er, you start off think­ing that it’s a chal­lenge, he may very well de­cide to sit this one out.”

Ra­goonath not­ed that Duke’s strongest base re­mains in Rox­bor­ough but ques­tioned whether that sup­port is enough for the PDP to even cap­ture a seat.

Po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Dr Win­ford James was more di­rect, say­ing Duke has al­ready stepped back from the elec­tion.

“I told you that he is not go­ing to par­tic­i­pate in these elec­tions,” James said.

He added that Duke’s po­lit­i­cal chal­lenges stem part­ly from ad­mis­sions he made af­ter the Gen­er­al Elec­tion.

“Re­mem­ber that he asked Ka­mala for a job,” James said. “Once you be­gin to do that, you can’t be chief sec­re­tary.”

James al­so said Duke’s past po­lit­i­cal de­ci­sions con­tin­ue to af­fect him, in­clud­ing his pub­lic claim that he “built” and “owns” the PDP.

“Peo­ple in To­ba­go are very out­spo­ken,” he said.

“I don’t think they like the idea that one man is say­ing, ‘This is my par­ty. I built it.’”

He said Duke’s ac­tions and in­ter­nal con­flicts from pre­vi­ous years have al­so left long mem­o­ries among vot­ers.

“Peo­ple re­mem­ber, and he can­not win back enough peo­ple to un­seat Far­ley,” he said.

Both an­a­lysts agreed that Duke’s si­lence is not a po­lit­i­cal strat­e­gy but a sign of re­treat, leav­ing the PDP with­out a clear pres­ence in the race.

How­ev­er, with the In­no­v­a­tive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Al­liance step­ping for­ward, the TPP de­fend­ing its record, and the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment po­si­tion­ing it­self for a come­back, the an­a­lysts said the ab­sence of Duke may not shift the po­lit­i­cal land­scape in favour of any sin­gle par­ty.