Former leading PPP/C luminary Ralph Ramkarran says that the PPP has to craft a new constitution which defines policies, removes power from the leadership elite and restores it to the membership in order to throw back “the encroaching control of negative forces hostile to the ideals of the PPP.”
In a column to appear in tomorrow’s Sunday Stabroek, Ramkarran said that with the collapse of communism and the then unipolar world, the PPP abandoned its longstanding adherence to and promotion of Marxism-Lennism and is now in the grip of an increasingly powerful entrepreneurial class which benefits enormously from procurement and other government activities. The party is to hold a key congress in August at which this matter among a host of others will likely arise.
Ramkarran argued that the PPP’s “Central Committee and Executive Committee are now under the increasing control of members who have no understanding of or interest in socialist or Marxist principles. Espousal of socialism, even of the social democratic variety, has ceased. The Party has become afraid of even the shadow of its ideology, is embarrassed by it and makes no mention of it. The Marxist-Leninist constitution is still in place but no one dares to bell the cat. The current leadership is in a dilemma and does not know how to get out of this conundrum lest they be accused of tampering with the legacy of Cheddi Jagan.”
Contending that there is no current ideologically oriented leader who commands intellectual respect in or out of the PPP, Ramkarran said that the “The reality today is that within a broadly acceptable economic and development direction, the PPP’s detailed economic policy choices is subject to the influence of the growing and increasingly powerful entrepreneurial and bureaucratic class who benefit enormously from procurement and other government activities. The Party is in the grip of these forces and that grip is tightening. Everyone in the Central Committee and beyond is aware of this and talk about it but dare not say so publicly.”
This appeared to be a reference to a new group of businessmen and others who sprung to prominence during the tenure of former President Bharrat Jagdeo. Jagdeo also wielded significant control over the party’s organs and was able to shepherd the candidacy of current President, Donald Ramotar, analysts have said.
Ramkarran, who resigned from the party after nearly 50 years of membership after a row over his concerns about widespread corruption, said that a fundamental revision of the Party constitution must also examine and propose changes to its governance structure and methods. “The current system gives tight control of the Party to its leadership and this control it will not want to relinquish. The democratization of the Party is a major project. The lack of democracy is responsible for much of the problems which are being encountered at this time and if the leadership grip is not slackened from the membership, not only will its electoral problems become worse but it will be completely taken over by the forces which are beginning to threaten its existence as a progressive political force with high ideals”, Ramkarran said.
