Sealing the leadership of the PNCR as expected, Aubrey Norton was on Sunday also declared by the 22nd Biennial Congress to be the party’s presidential candidate and it left it solely up to him to decide on any other arrangement for the contesting of the presidency.
The motion passed by the congress on him being the presidential candidate is seen as significant in light of recent suggestions that there could be a consensual figure among opposition parties for the 2025 elections for which a preliminary voters list has been issued.
It would mean that Norton would have to be persuaded to step aside if he was not the consensual candidate. There have been intimations that the Alliance For Change’s new leader Nigel Hughes could be presented as a consensual presidential candidate.
With official results only having been released yesterday morning despite being promised on Sunday evening, the three-day Congress was riven by further controversy on Saturday when several key figures withdrew their nominations for executive positions.