Dear Editor,
I just saw a report of the outgoing PNC leader’s address to the PNC’s bi-annual congress in another section of the media. According to the report: Mr. Granger cited Jai Narine Singh, the first General Secretary, as someone who allowed personal and political ambition to smother party allegiance and broke away to form the Guianese Independence Movement party; Sydney King, (later Eusi Kwayana), also a former General Secretary who broke from the PNC in 1961 and helped to establish the Working People’s Alliance; Hamilton Green, another former General Secretary , broke front the Party in 1993 and established the Good and Green for Guyana; Raphael Trotman, an elected PNC Member of Parliament, broke from the Party in 2005 and established the Alliance For Change. “The Guiana Independence Movement, the Working People’s Alliance, the Good and Green for Guyana and the Alliance for Change all wounded their ‘mother’ party.”
I write not to contest Mr. Granger’s interpretation of the history of the PNC, but to offer some facts in regard to Eusi Kwayana and the PNC that he either may be unaware of or neglected. First, it is not true to say that Kwayana “broke from the PNC in 1961”. The record shows that he was expelled from the PNC in 1961. However, while he never rejoined the PNC, he continued to support the party and urged his supporters to vote for it at the 1961 election. When he was approach-ed by citizens to contest the 1964 election under the banner of ASCRIA, he decided not to do so after discussion with PNC leader, Forbes Burnham. Again, he urged his supporters to vote for the PNC at the 1964 election. When the PNC came to power in1964, Kwayana turned down an offer to represent the country at the United Nations. He instead opted to visit thirteen African countries to introduce the new government to African leaders. Kwayana would serve without pay in key non-cabinet positions in the PNC-led government. He campaigned for the party at the 1968 election and again urged his supporters to vote for the PNC. It was Kwayana who suggested to Mr. Burnham the “Coopera-tive” in Guyana’s Cooperative Republic. If Mr. Granger considers the above as wounding the PNC, then he has to explain,
Kwayana and ASCRIA eventually severed ties with the PNC in 1971 over official corruption. ASCRIA along with Moses Bhagwan’s IPRA, Clive Thomas’ RATOON and Brindley Benn’s WPVP together formed the WPA in 1974. Bhagwan and Benn had left the PPP in which they were leading figures. If one were to accept Mr. Granger’s thesis, then the PPP is also the WPA’s mother party and it would have wounded that party too.
Sincerely,
David Hinds
WPA Executive Member