As con­fet­ti blew past the over­grown and un­fin­ished struc­ture of the pro­posed Shi­va Boys’ Hin­du Col­lege, cheers erupt­ed among scores of Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) sup­port­ers turned out to wel­come Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s mo­tor­cade in her Siparia con­stituen­cy.

The sec­ondary school is one of sev­er­al projects ini­ti­at­ed un­der the UNC-led Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship gov­ern­ment be­tween 2010 and 2015 but left in­com­plete by the PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar, who ar­rived two hours and 35 min­utes lat­er than the sched­uled start time, was quick­ly sur­round­ed by en­thu­si­as­tic sup­port­ers dressed in yel­low and blue—many try­ing to record videos or hop­ing for a hand­shake or hug.