By Sue-Ann Wayow

POLITICAL leader of the Patriotic Front Mickela Panday declares she is not here to inherit the past but to build the future of Trinidad and Tobago.

Panday, daughter of former prime minister Basdeo Panday, in an address to the nation on Sunday said, “I am not here to inherit the past, I am here to build the future, yes I am the daughter of a man who gave his life for this country.”

Her father did not lead for applause but for the people she said.

“I stand proud not in his shadow but in his light. I will carry forward the values he lived by but I will hold my own vision because I know  too many of you are feeling, tired frustrated, forgotten,” Panday said.

Since stepping up to the political arena for General Election 2025, Panday has been accused of several things, from other political platforms and people on social media.

Some supporters of the party her father founded the United National Congress (UNC) have labelled her “an entitled one” while others claim that she was wilfully aiding the People’s National Movement (PNM) to ensure a UNC loss at the polls on April 28.

On Sunday night, Panday also spoke at a public meeting at Twin Walls in San Fernando.

She told attendees, “Tonight I made an address to the nation, and because we are not being funded by the PNM it is on social media, not the national television.”

Panday repeated parts of her 11-minute message that was posted on Facebook.

She said, “The shift has begun. The old politics has failed us, year after year, election after election, we hear the same old tired promises, we hear the same names, we endure the same results, frustration, struggle and silence from those who are supposed to serve us.”

In her address to the nation Panday said, “I speak to a people wide awake, awake to the worn out words of a government that has lost its credibility and its compass. Awake to an opposition too wounded to fight, too divided to lead and too compromised to speak with conviction.”

General Election 2025 was a reset.

“A  reset of what leadership means in our beloved country,” Panday said.

She told citizens, “I see you, I hear you, I am here to fight for you because that is what a patriot does…The patriotic front is the only genuine alternative, a movement for real change, rooted, not in race or division but in unity and  a shared love for our country.”

Panday said the majority of people reaching out to her did not want money or opportunities but food – a basic necessity.

In her address, she shared three of her party’s economic recovery plan for Trinidad and Tobago.

These include:

·       Operation Safe Zones – reclaiming of streets. This will be done through a unified approach of prevention, detection, prosecution and rehabilitation.

·       Prosperity through possibility – activation of a modern economy built of sport, medical and eco – tourism, manufacturing, modern farming systems and revitalised fishing villages with Tobago included.

·       Tackle food security as a national defence – improving food security into a driver of economic resilience, modernising local agriculture, empowering agri-entrepreneurs and building smart climate-resilient supply chains.