General Secretary of the Alliance for Change (AFC) David Patterson believes that his party has successfully advocated for a reduction in the powers of Minister of State Joseph Harmon.
Speaking with reporters at the party headquarters yesterday, Patterson said that while the party will not be boasting of successes, the issues identified have been addressed.
“Those issues that we spoke about have been addressed but we are not going to go around crowing. We are part of a coalition. The AFC has never been a party to brag,” he said.
In April, the AFC leadership blamed the concentration of various powers in Harmon as being responsible for the problems that flared up around government at that time. The party had argued that Harmon’s responsibilities as Cabinet Secretary, Minister of State in the Ministry of the Presidency and the effective Head of the Presidential Secretariat were too much. It had said that the responsibilities of each of the portfolios are substantial and of vital importance to the smooth operations of the government and would, therefore, benefit from separate appointments.
Asked to specifically identify the ways in which the minister’s power has been reduced, Patterson maintained that the changes are clear to those who look with untainted eyes.
Pressed by media, he explained that there is now “clear delineation of authority, no blurring of authority, clear delineation of ministerial responsibilities, no overlapping, no grey areas which was the genesis of several of the issues reported. That’s not happening and I challenge you to see if there is any overlap anywhere.”
He later explained that at present the coalition is weakened by a failure on the part of its activists on the ground to communicate.
“Communication at our lower levels, that is an issue which both parties struggle with. We have interparty dialogue. However the message doesn’t meet our activists who need to work together,” he noted.
Patterson accepted blame on behalf of the AFC as he has not been able to meet with activists as frequently as he wished, therefore they have been acting on directives which have become outdated.
National Conference
This issue, as well as several others, is expected to be addressed at the AFC’s National Conference, which is due and will be held before the end of the year.
The last conference, which was held on December 6, 2014, resulted in a directive to the party leadership to enter into coalition talks. These talks culminated in the Cummingsburg Accord, which governs the ruling APNU+AFC coalition.
Patterson noted that the directive originated from the now justified belief that a coalition was the only formula for removing the People’s Progressive Party/Civic.
“Since then the AFC has demonstrated that it is a small but robust political party capable of public administration and we believe we have performed creditably in that role thus far,” he said.
The party expects to spend this year’s conference addressing several matters including the election of office bearers for the new term, examination of its role and progress in government, review of the relations with Coalition partners, evaluation of the fulfillment of the coalition manifesto and the advancement of the process of actually documenting the structure and architecture of government under a new constitution from the AFC’s point of view.
