Much has been written about the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) and its contributions towards removing the Forbes Burnham dictatorship. The WPA lost its lustre and spunk when its de facto leader, Walter Rodney, was assassinated in 1980. Rodney must be getting dizzy from spinning in his grave today because his WPA colleagues, once advocates for a politics of morality, are now loyal partners in a coalition with the People’s National Congress (PNC); the same party the Rodney Commission of Inquiry said was wholly responsible for the murder of Rodney. Is the Alliance For Change (AFC) heading toward a similar death?
The AFC was established in 2005 when three MPs – Raphael Trotman (PNC), Khemraj Ramjattan ([People’s Progressive Party] (PPP)) and Sheila Holder (WPA) joined forces to form the AFC. The AFC won six seats after gaining eight per cent votes in the 2006 elections. In 2011, the party received 8.1 per cent of the votes, winning six seats in the 2011 election. In the 2015 elections, the party won seven seats with 10.3 per cent of the votes. To contest the 2015 elections, the AFC formed a joint electoral list with the APNU – even though Ramjattan argued that an alliance with the PNC would render the party “dead meat”. The combined list won 33 seats, allowing the APNU/AFC leader David A Granger to oust the PPP to become President with a one seat majority Government. Prior to the elections, AFC signed the Cummingsburg Accord with the APNU, which would guarantee 40 per cent of Cabinet and parliamentary seats to the AFC for bringing in 11 per cent of the votes to the joint coalition. Nagamootoo, lured into the AFC by Ramjattan, promised to bring in 11 per cent of the votes to give the coalition a winning majority in 2015.
What is now clearly evident in Guyanese politics is the fact that the AFC is neither a third force nor an influential force in the governing coalition. It is more like a spent force. In Opposition, the AFC worked closely with the APNU to pass a No-Confidence Motion forcing the PPP to hold elections within three months. This collaboration took place while the AFC continued to proclaim itself a multiracial third force that would never join the PNC or PPP.
Now part of the governing coalition, the AFC has no real power in Government. The Cummingsburg Accord stipulated that the Prime Minister (Moses Nagamootoo) would be drawn from the AFC and would be responsible for domestic affairs and all Ministers should report to the Prime Minister. This is not the case. Instead, the Office of the Presidency has emasculated some of the powers of the Prime Minister, thus rendering the 60-40 formula as insignificant. With Ramjattan in charge of domestic security affairs, crime has escalated and the Government seems at a loss to adopt a serious crime fighting strategy. The economy continues to stumble. And more recently, Dr Verasammy Ramayya, the AFC’s key election mobiliser in Berbice, who played a key role in steering Indians away from the PPP, has resigned.
The foundation of the coalition partnership, the Cummingsburg agreement was influenced by Raphael Trotman, a vocal supporter of a coalition in 2015. But Trotman has maintained his close links with the PNC and he manipulated the AFC into a position which allowed Granger to win the presidency, the most powerful position in the country. Trotman (in a secret agreement with Granger before the 2015 elections in Nassau, The Bahamas) convinced Nagamootoo that he would be chairing Cabinet meetings. Needless to say, Nagamootoo’s promised powers all but evaporated, once in office.
Despite what Nagamootoo may think, Trotman is a political Machiavellian who successfully engineered a plan to defeat the PPP. He was once accused by a former AFC founder, Gomattie Singh, the Essequibo-based lawyer, of racism. Ms Singh was promised the position of being an AFC parliamentarian, but the offer was withdrawn by Trotman.
In reality, the AFC has lost its way. It will continue to face its demons as the party is being outmanoeuvred by the PNC elements, who are now firmly in the seat of power. It will continue to act relevant until the 2020 election. But, as Freddie Kissoon reminded us, Guyana has no place for third parties. The AFC’s fate will imitate that of the United Force of D’Aguiar.
If the WPA died in 1980, following that line of reasoning, the AFC died the day the coalition Government was sworn in. The APNU/AFC Government is a de facto PNC Government with President Granger, an admirer of Burnham, at the helm.
