PORT OF SPAIN, April 29, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - Residents of Trinidad and Tobago voted in parliamentary elections Monday that will also determine who becomes prime minister as the twin-island Caribbean nation battles an economic slump and rise in gang violence.

Former energy minister Stuart Young, 50, took over as prime minister in March when party colleague Keith Rowley stepped down after 10 years in the job to make way for new blood.

But Young's position appears to be at risk with his center-left People's National Movement (PNM) lagging in polls behind the centrist United National Congress (UNC) of former prime minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, 73.

Persad-Bissessar campaigned on promises of higher public wages, and said Monday that election day "is for the mother walking the aisles of the grocery store with her children, always with a pen, a pencil, or a calculator in hand because food prices keep rising and she has to keep tabs on what she can buy."

Young has accused his rival of peddling false promises, saying there was "no way that a government, any government, could afford" the additional $2-billion bill he said her program of pay increases would entail.

For his part, Young said he stood for "a Trinidad and Tobago... where our state sector works for you and with you, where services are faster and simpler. Where your time and your dignity is respected."

Voters are electing the 41 members of the House of Representatives, parliament's lower house.

Any party that emerges with a majority of seats will form a new government with its leader as prime minister.

If none does, a coalition government is likely.

- 'Vulnerable' to criminals -

The election takes place against the backdrop of a severe security crisis in the nation better known for its carnival, nature and sandy beaches.

A total of 623 murders were recorded last year -- up from 577 in 2023 -- many of them linked to Latin America-based criminal gangs, including Venezuela's infamous Tren de Aragua, which the United States has designated a terrorist group.

According to a US Department of State report from March, the murder rate of 37 per 100,000 people made Trinidad and Tobago the sixth most dangerous nation in the world last year.

The report noted the country's southern border, about 10 miles from the Venezuelan coast, was "vulnerable to illegal migration, drug trafficking, and human trafficking and smuggling."

To try and restore order, the government imposed a state of emergency between December and mid-April.

The Caribbean's second-largest producer of natural gas, Trinidad and Tobago has also been battling an economic downturn blamed partly on a decline in production.

It had been banking on exploitation of the Dragon gas field in nearby Venezuelan waters, but has seen its licence withdrawn by the administration of US President Donald Trump under renewed sanctions against that country.