Obama

NEW YORK (CMC):

With six days to go before next Tuesday's presidential election in the United States, leaders within New York's West Indian community have intensified calls for registered voters to cast their ballots for the Democratic candidate, Barack Obama.

Among those who have been openly campaigning for Obama over the Republican Party's candidate John McCain is former New York City Councillor Una Clarke, who declared this week as 'Obama Week'.

"We don't think there's a shortage of people to vote in the community, but it's critical that people go out and vote on Election Day for Obama," the Jamaica-born Clark said in an interview with the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC).

"We have to show that we're a voting community," she added.

Seeking 'overwhelming numbers'

Clarke, who now serves as president of the Progressive Democratic Political Association of Central Brooklyn, said she was working towards 'overwhelming numbers' of people turning out to vote for Obama.

"Our headquarters is open to the Obama people to make all their calls to battleground states, such as North Carolina, Florida and Pennsylvania ... we're also working with them to get out the vote," she said.

Zamal Sankar, the Guyana-born head of Caribbean Americans for Obama, has also urged the community to join the 'Movement for Change'.

Transformational figure

Una Clarke

"There is no time like the present to change our future," he said, while calling on other West Indians to join him in canvassing for the Democratic candidate.

About 92.9 per cent of West Indians in the United States plan to vote for Obama, according to a recent poll conducted by the Brooklyn-based Everybody's magazine.

Everybody's publisher Grenadian Herman Hall, a registered Republican, said the survey was conducted long before the famous Caribbean-American General Colin Powell endorsed Senator Obama.

Powell, the son of Jamaican immigrants and a registered Republican, recently endorsed Obama instead of McCain.

"I think he is a transformational figure," said Powell, a former Secretary of State in the George W Bush administration.