Parties on the net
By Lisa Allen-Agostini
ALL THREE major political parties have official Web sites where interested people can go to find party information and contact party representatives.
The ruling People’s National Movement can be found at
www.pnm.org.tt; the Opposition United National Congress at
www.unc.org.tt; and Congress of the People at congresstnt.com.
While each of the three sites incorporates basic elements such as the party's constitution, an archive of speeches and press clippings, they differ radically in layout and other content.
For example, the COP site is a simple one, with only one photo (of party leader Winston Dookeran) and simple graphics, while the UNC’s is loaded with images.
The PNM site includes a history of the party and biographies of its past leaders, but the UNC’s doesn’t. (Basdeo Panday has been the only UNC leader so far, and there is no bio of him on the site.)
However, it’s only on the UNC site you can find a link to the new and ever-popular social networking site Facebook.com, where you can join a UNC group.
UNC tops list
For sheer impact, the UNC site probably tops the list. It is bold yellow, with large photo-based graphics illustrating various campaign issues such as “Fighting crime our top priority,” and “Continuing our education reforms.”
It’s also the most up-to-date site, with its most recent posting on the home page placed on September 19, 2007.
The bold graphics don’t yield links to documents corresponding to their themes, and elsewhere on the site there is little indication of how the party intends to do what it says it will do on the relevant issues.
Instead, like the PNM site, the UNC site includes comprehensive lists of the party’s previous accomplishments.
The Web site makes no overt reference to the Alliance between the UNC and such parties as NAR, YesTT and the NDP, although the Alliance is referred to in the site’s press clippings and media statements.
COP details plans
Over at the COP site, the party has posted a long and detailed account of its plans in areas such as national security and crime, education, health, transportation and community and local government.
As the only leading party without a track record in government, it focuses heavily on what it will do, instead of what it has done, and compares its approaches with those of the PNM.
There is a comprehensive biography of party leader Winston Dookeran on the site, and the COP is the only party that lists its executive members on its Web site, along with the names of sitting party Members of Parliament.
At the top of the UNC home page is a donation form with pre-selected amounts from US $25 and up, while a similar section on the COP site starts with suggested donations of TT$10.
There doesn’t seem to be a donation form on the PNM site.
PNM site well-designed
On the PNM site, under the heading “Constituency highlights” in the index section “Newsroom,” there are only pictures from Diego Martin Central, Ken Valley’s constituency.
It is one of the few glitches in the site, which otherwise probably proves the best designed and most fleshed-out of the three.
Some of the most interesting spots on the site are the audio-visual section, in which one can view PM Patrick Manning’s speech from the party’s 40th annual convention—though it was posted there two years ago—and the party newsletter Magnum (posted in February, 2007).
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Designed by: Randall Rajkumar-Maharaj · Updated daily by: Nicholas Attai
