(Trinidad Express) Trinidad and Tobago’s fifth President will be elected on February 15 and some of the top candidates in the race, according to sources, are House Speaker Wade Mark, former head of British Petroleum (BPTT) Robert Riley and political analyst Dr Hamid Ghany.
Communications Minister Jamal Mohammed, at Thursday’s post-Cabinet news conference at the Office of the Prime Minister, St Clair, announced that a meeting of the electoral college will be convened on February 15—three days after Carnival—for the election of a new President to replace George Maxwell Richards. Sources told the Express that Mark, Riley and Ghany, as well as Senate President Timothy Hamel-Smith and Chief Justice Ivor Archie, were being considered. Contacted by phone, Mark declined comment on the matter but said that he remains in charge under sections 26 to 33 of the Constitution to convene a meeting of the electoral college and preside as chairman.
The Express understands that should Mark be selected, the deputy Speaker of the House will probably preside over the electoral process. Efforts to contact the other candidates proved futile. Mohammed outlined the process, saying that the Constitution provides that there shall be an electoral college for the purpose of the election of a President comprising members of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The electoral college, he said, is convened by the House Speaker and its procedure is governed by the electoral college regulation 1976 made under section 28:04 of the Constitution.
