Robert Corbin’s absence from A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) leadership team and from the coalition’s lists of candidates is in keeping with the PNCR leader’s publicly stated position of not seeking public office, APNU presidential candidate David Granger has said.
Mr Corbin has publicly announced that he will not be on the list and he is not competing for political office at this election,” Granger told Stabroek News recently in an interview. PNCR leader Corbin, while speaking to this newspaper recently, indicated that he wouldnot be returning to parliament when the 10th parliament is convened. Corbin was noticeably absent from APNU’s leadership team and from the lists of candidates submitted by the party on Nomination Day.
Granger indicated that Corbin’s decision was entirely up to him. “He is still an official of the party and the party has a constitution that is different from the APNU,” Granger stated. He added that Corbin’s decision not to seek public office, “allowed a democratic process to be put into effect… that is the primary process for the PNCR.
“If he hadn’t taken that decision, things would have been different,” he said.
At the party’s General Council meeting in March 2006, Corbin announced that he would not be its presidential candidate for the next election. He subsequently told reporters that the issue of who would be the PNCR’s presidential candidate was “overblown,” since the party was looking to forge a wide platform and develop a programme and personnel which would be able to take the country forward.
In February this year, Granger was elected as the PNCR’s presidential candidate, narrowly defeating former PNCR finance minister Carl Greenidge. Vice Chairman Basil Williams, former PNC government Minister Dr Faith Harding and attorney James Bond also vied to be the party’s presidential candidate in a process which included the holding of several town hall-style meetings all across the country, before the wider membership of the party voted on a candidate.
Following Granger’s election, the party continued negotiations it had previously started with other opposition parties and eventually decided on a statement of principles.
This eventually led to the formation of APNU, with Granger later chosen as its presidential candidate. WPA co-leader Rupert Roopnaraine was recently named APNU’s prime ministerial candidate and the co-chairman of the party’s leadership team.
APNU’s leadership team includes university lecturer Dr Rishee Thakur and conservationist Sydney Allicock, Anthony Vieira, Dion Abrams, Tabitha Sarabo, Nicole Telford, Keith Scott, Vaughn Phillips, Desmond Trotman and Annette Ferguson. Other members of the team are: Greenidge, Dr George Norton, Volda Lawrence, James Bond, Bishwaishwar ‘Cammie’ Ramsaroop, Dawn Hastings, Africo Selman, Deborah Backer, Christopher Jones, Cheryl Sampson, Basil Williams, Amna Ally and Ganesh Mahipaul.
