The exclusion by the PNCR of senior party officials such as Volda Lawrence, Basil Williams and Amna Ally from its list of parliamentarians is intended to pave the way for former Minister of State, Joseph Harmon to play the premier role in the House for APNU+AFC and to become Opposition Leader, analysts say.
This gambit, analysts say, underlines the pivotal link between former President David Granger and Harmon which was evident from the day APNU+AFC entered office in 2015 and the latter was named Minister of State and seen as a likely successor to Granger.
With Granger shunting aside top party leaders from the MPs list, analysts say it is left to be seen whether there is pushback to Granger and Harmon from the PNCR whose image has been battered by the failed five-month attempt to hand APNU+AFC a rigged victory at the March 2nd general elections.
Last week, Harmon was co-opted by Granger into the Central Executive Committee of the PNCR, a harbinger of what was to follow this week with the shock exclusion of Lawrence from the list. Lawrence – seen as the most popular PNCR Leader in Georgetown and Region Four – had been elected to the second most important position in the party of PNCR Chair just under two years ago, defeating both Harmon and Williams in the process.
While her image has suffered from various indiscretions since 2015, her exclusion from the list of MPs would be seen as unthinkable and a move by Granger to shape the future of the party using an outsider – Harmon – who has attracted negative publicity for a range of reasons in the last five years and more particularly during the elections crisis when he was seen as the key figure trying to force an illegal swearing in of Granger.
Harmon was last week formally dismissed by the Office of the President as Director General after he showed no inclination to resign following the swearing in of the PPP/C’s Irfaan Ali as President.
The APNU+AFC Coalition released the names of it 31 parliamentarians yesterday and as previously reported Lawrence, Ally and Williams and Granger have not been included.
The decision to exclude executive members of the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) specifically Lawrence who is party Chairperson has been vociferously criticized by some party members including James Bond but former General Secretary Oscar Clarke has told Stabroek News it is not something that should cause concern.
“I am not confused nor upset and no one should be,” he said in an invited comment.
Criteria
According to Clarke, the criteria appears to be that anyone who has served more than two terms will not be returning to the House.
“We wanted to get a few young people there. In fact there are good young people who have not been included but from the PNCR point of view it is a good list. There are a lot of women. Half the list is women and I am happy about that too,” he said.
Asked how the criteria could be applied to former President Granger who served as a parliamentarian for only one term, Clarke said it was not expected that Granger would return to the House after serving as president.
“He wants to keep the party intact and work to mobilize and that’s what we need our seasoned members doing,” he said.
Clarke acknowledged that there appear to be several ruffled feathers within the party and said it was likely due to poor communication.
“The problem seems to be communication. The way people were told or not told seems to have caused issues but the list is not concerning. Although I don’t think if you are operating at that level you truly wouldn’t know that these decisions are being made,” he explained.
The former parliamentarian repeatedly stressed that his hope is that the young persons selected for the House work well and receive the mentorship they need to become parliamentarians.
He remembered being mentored by the then speaker Aubrey Percival Alleyne when he entered the assembly in 1964 and explained that at that time Hamilton Green who was the party’s General Secretary was not a parliamentarian.
Party Leader Forbes Burnham is said to have argued that the General Secretary was needed to keep up the strength of the party.
“If the party as the instrument is not strong then it cannot stay in government. The intention behind keeping the senior executives out of parliament is to make sure the party remains strong and stable and that mobilization happens. We need them to work in strengthening the party,” he explained adding that he did not serve in the Assembly while he held the post of General Secretary from 1998 to 2017.
Current General Secretary, Amna Ally shared similar sentiments.
Ally told Stabroek News that having served in the Assembly for over a decade she believes it was enough.
Conceded
“I conceded to that. I was happy to tell the leader of the list that I would not want to go back since the criteria called for those who served for many terms to step aside. We had persons who have been in parliament for more than 20 years. We can’t be there forever. It is time to find the next Amna Ally in a new crop,” she explained.
According to Ally she is happy to encourage and support the young parliamentarians while focusing differently.
Asked how she would address those who consider their exclusion a slight, Ally stressed that they should recognize that others need a chance.
“The leader has even excused himself. It is not a slight. We served for many, many years. It is time to step aside,” she noted adding that her energies will be spent on improving the party.
In a release from the PNCR the 22 APNU parliamentarians were identified as Geeta Chandan-Edmond, Dr. Karen Cummings, Annette Ferguson, Nima Flue-Bess, Tabitha Sarabo-Halley, Dawn Hastings-Williams, Nicolette Henry, Coretta McDonald, Maureen Philadelphia, Natasha Singh-Lewis, Amanza Walton-Desir, Ronald Cox, Jermaine Figueira, Roysdale Forde, Joseph Harmon, Vincent Henry, Shurwayne Holder, Dineshwar Jaipersaud, Christopher Jones, Vinceroy Jordan , Ganesh Mahipal and Richard Sinclair.
These names in addition to the nine announced by the AFC on Monday will occupy the opposition benches alongside Lenox Shuman of the Liberty and Justice Party when the 12th Parliament convenes.
Notably the parliamentarians which will represent the APNU+AFC were announced by the PNCR in a release which made no mention of the APNU coalition.
According to the release the PNCR has taken a bold step forward and extracted candidates who are the face of the future.
“The PNCR has always advocated that young people are essential to Guyana’s development. An integral task of leadership is to groom and mould the leaders of the future. In this regard, the PNCR has demonstrated, more than any other political entity in Guyana, that it is prepared to take the bold and decisive initiative to prepare for the future,” the party explained
“We are rebuilding and strengthening the PNCR. The PNCR is convinced that …a strong and united party will bring greater national benefits for all the people of Guyana. The new parliamentarians, along with senior leaders and members of the PNCR will fan-out across the country to rebuild and strengthen the Party in advance of the upcoming local government elections,” they note.
This focus on the PNCR has led some commentators to question whether the APNU is still a functioning coalition.
According to one member this is not the case.
JFAP
Speaking with Stabroek News yesterday, executive member of the Justice for All Party, Savitree Sharma said that the JFAP has been completely sidelined.
No representative of the party was selected to sit in the Assembly and the party was never consulted on the list.
“We feel that we have been used…and at this point we can see no reason for sticking with them but we will consider our options before acting,” she explained.
According to Sharma that last meeting of APNU that they are aware of occurred on August 5 but they were not invited.
“We made a statement calling for the party to concede and end the impasse which lasted for five months…that statement appears to have helped them to decide to keep us out,” she posited, adding that the party had already been marginalized and ignored.
“If they did not coalesce they would not have been in office. They needed us and the other small parties for the crossover vote but as soon as they won we became window dressing. We were not even invited to the inauguration. At no time at were smaller parties involved in decision making. We were shut out,” Sharma said.
She further explained that though there was an agreement that each of the smaller parties would have one seat the PNCR appears to be hogging as many APNU seats as they can.
It had been reported that Granger was seeking to have each party prove a certain volume of membership before they could be allowed to occupy a seat but Sharma noted that they were never asked to provide any information.
“At no time at all were we asked anything. In 2011 we had the votes. Mr (CN) Sharma had the following. He has since gotten sick and is not as active but the reality is when he said he doesn’t want cardboard parties it’s because they want all the seats for the PNCR. They don’t need or want us anymore,” she concluded.
The APNU is comprised of the PNCR, JFAP, Working People’s Alliance (WPA), the Guyana Action Party (GAP) and the National Front Alliance (NFA).
The WPA is represented on the list of parliamentarians by Tabitha Sarabo-Halley while GAP is represented by Vincent Henry. There is no listed member of the NFA and attempts to reach the party leader Keith Scott proved futile.
