IBRAHIM FOR BARATARIA: WE TOLD YOU SO

THE naming of Senate Vice President Dr. Muhammed Yunis Ibrahim as the People’s National Movement’s (PNM) general election candidate for Barataria-San Juan has again proven us correct.

In January 2023, this news site wrote that Ibrahim would be selected to contest the marginal constituency on behalf of the ruling party.

The approval of his candidacy by the PNM’s Screening Committee will lead to a head-to-head contest with incumbent Saddam Hosein of United National Congress (UNC) in a seat with a large number of Muslim electors.

Ibrahim was placed as Senate Vice President at the same time that Christine Kangaloo was named the country’s President.

CounterpunchTT said that in the respective appointments, Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley was making direct overtures to members of the Islamic and Presbyterian faiths.

Ibrahim has deep family roots in the PNM, is a prominent dental surgeon with a large number of business-owning relatives and a former President of the Supermarkets Association.

Observers say that PNM canvassers have already begun their field campaign in the constituency, confirming voter registration and other exercises.

Barataria-San Juan is considered a swing constituency, with Hosein polling 8,300 votes in 2020, to the PNM’s Jason Williams’ 7,240.

With the demographics of the constituency, Williams was considered an ill-suited candidate.

The seat was retained for a generation by PNM veteran Kamaluddin Mohammed and later represented by the UNC’s Fuad Khan.

The PNM is also targeting Chaguanas East, currently held by UNC’s Vandana Mohit, and has named Richi Sookhai as its candidate.

Sookhai is a junior minister in the Ministry of Works and Transport, which is carrying out infrastructural improvements in some of the communities.

The candidate is a former President of the Chaguanas Chamber of Industry and Commerce.

In the 2020 general election, Mohit polled 8,969 votes, to 7,882 by PNM’s Clarence Rambharat.

Renuka Sagramsingh, a Minister in the office of the Attorney General, is returning as the PNM’s candidate for St. Augustine.

UNC’s Khadijah Ameen won the seat in 2020, with 11,943 votes to Sangramsingh’s 5,204.

The PNM is also eyeing Moruga-Tableland, another marginal constituency currently represented by the UNC’s Michelle Benjamin.

Benjamin secured 10,534 votes in 2020, to 9,462 by the PNM’s Winston “Gypsy” Peters.

 There are growing indications that the election will be called within the next few weeks.