Dear Editor,
Stabroek News of January 12 reported that President Jagdeo “warned that using a secret balloting process to decide on the PPP’s next presidential candidate could be dangerous as candidate hopefuls could promise persons things in order to get their votes.” He reportedly continued as follows: “I am going to say openly who I support [and] I am going to say for what reasons too.”
If Mr Jagdeo’s remarks were correctly reported then he has provided the main reason why secret balloting must be used in the selection of the PPP’s presidential candidate. Here we have the President of Guyana operating under what is essentially Burnham’s constitution saying that he will openly support a candidate and then have a body comprised of a number of persons who rely on the state to support their standard of living vote by a show of hands.
One must wonder if Mr Jagdeo confused his arguments as his conclusion is clearly at odds with his reasoning. As a matter of fact, there is no possible cogent argument that could be advanced for selection by show of hands under prevailing circumstances at Freedom House, so it is not surprising that statements in support of such a mode of selection degenerate into gobbledygook. Gobbledygook could be humorous but not when the future of a political party with a glorious history is at stake and when the presidency of a country is likely being decided. It is time that sober heads prevail and the possibility of retribution be removed from the candidate selection process. As this writer mentioned in a previous letter, to do otherwise would be to court disaster.
Yours faithfully,
Jang Singh
