Local Govt. polls in 2010
Local Government representatives get another year in office. Meanwhile, are drains cleaned and garbage collected on time?
In the 1960s, the People’s National Movement (PNM) suspended Local Government polls for eight long years- between 1960 and 1968- after a less than favourable showing at the 1959 County Council elections. Then, the combined opposition –Democratic Labour Party, Butler Party and independents won 38 of the 72 seats.
The PNM, although gaining the ascendancy in the July 2003 Local Government elections has returned to its old ways of repeatedly postponing the polls thereby giving the incumbents seven years in office.
Local Government Minister Hazel Manning, in her characteristic sweet, sincere manner, assured the House of Representatives yesterday that there would be elections next year. The process of reform would be completed in six to nine months time. She spoke’ effusively, of training of Local Government personnel, the utilisation of information technology as she tried to convince suspicious Opposition members that the reforms will result in benefits to the public.
Hazel’s style, body language and delivery make her one of the more credible MPs but that did not prevent Opposition Leader Basdeo Panday from calling for elections in a couple of months time. Panday argued that the Government was afraid of calling the elections because of falling popularity. Chaguanas West MP Jack Warner warned that “what we have is an emerging dictatorship”.
The Municipal Corporations Bill was passed on Monday night and will go to the Senate this afternoon where there is expected to be a lively debate. The legislation will be sent before a Joint Select Committee of Parliament where it would be streamlined and brought back to Parliament.