(Trinidad Express) Trinidad and Tobago will see the return of Jack Warner to the political landscape.
“One thing I do know. I will not stay quiet…There is a large group of people who will not vote and what you have to do is to tap into those and I tell you in a matter of days if not weeks there will be a new political paradigm put out there to give people some hope and I don’t mean necessarily a political party either,” Warner told the Express by phone on Thursday.
Warner, who is 76 years of age, was the political leader of the Independent Liberal Party (ILP), a political party he formed in July 2013, after he was not reselected as the candidate for the Chaguanas West by-election for the United National Congress (UNC).
Warner created history reclaiming victory in Chaguanas West with 12,642 votes, defeating the UNC’s Khadijah Ameen, who got 5130 votes.
The ILP also contested 136 electoral districts in the local government elections in 2013 and won 102,918 votes. The party was not successful in securing any seats in the 2015 general election.
Warner said he would not necessarily return through the ILP but he plans to make a comeback.
He said he was disappointed in the People’s National Movement (PNM) Government as well as the UNC as the people do not have a sense of hope but he plans to bring that back.
“I am disappointed as many hundreds of thousands of people are. I had looked forward to a new dawn in politics…I think what we have done so far is exchange Tweedledum for Tweedledee,” he said.
Warner said the people are disenchanted and “they don’t know what to do because they are also fed up with the UNC”.
“I was in a function at Basta Hall, which is a UNC stronghold, and people were very disappointed with the UNC performance and that they are no behaving as an alternative government,” he said.
Warner said he spent three hours speaking with the people.
He said he has his battles to fight with respect to the allegations he is facing with FIFA.
Warner, who was works and transport minister and national security minister, under the Kamla Persad-Bissessar People’s Partnership government, said he always put country first and no one could level any accusation against him when it comes to serving the people of Trinidad and Tobago.
In 2013 he resigned as national security minister following a CONCACAF report which implicated him and his one-time ally Chuck Blazer as being “fraudulent in their management” of CONCACAF.