Implausible! Really? Wake up, Aubrey

Dear Editor,
The National and Regional Elections of 2025 in Guyana are over. The international observers who came to Guyana to observe the electoral process have all, without fail, reported that GECOM conducted elections that were marked by efficiency and that were free, fair and credible.
One significant result of the elections is the crushing blow dealt to Aubrey Norton and his PNC/WPA/APNU coalition. In relation to this group, I have heard one reporter referring to APNU as having been “hammered” and “devastated” by the electorate.
One example of this “hammering and/or devastation” occurred in District 4, which historically, the PNC described as its stronghold, and indeed it has been. In the just concluded 2025 elections, the APNU secured significantly fewer votes than it did in 2020. Aubrey Norton, presidential candidate of the APNU, has deemed this result implausible. Norton’s response demonstrates his stark unawareness of the prevailing political realities prior to the 2025 elections. His response reveals that he was completely out of touch with the mood, reactions and considerations of a significant number of his party’s supporters.
Prior to 1992, election results showed incredible numbers of votes for the PNC despite well-known public resentment for that party in Guyana. The rigging of elections by the PNC prior to 1992 has been well documented in print and film. Post 1992, through elections that were free and fair, the PNC secured votes consistent with its dwindled support. For the sake of argument, momentarily putting the rigging phenomenon aside, in 1992, one sees the decline of support for the PNC. In 1980, in elections of that year, the PNC, with total control of the electoral machinery, claimed to have won those elections with 312,988 votes. Similarly, in 1985, the PNC claimed to have won 228,718 votes. However, in 1992, the PNC were only able to muster 128,286. Quite a significant decline for a party that previously laid claim (falsely, as we know) to overwhelming national support.
So in 2025, Aubrey Norton describes the decimation of APNU by his political opponents as implausible. I say quite categorically, it was not! Explanations exist for the fate of Aubrey Norton and his APNU in the 2025 elections. Dennis Wiggins, in a letter to a local newspaper, wrote: “So, in this election period, APNU supporters were uninspired. Not only with their candidate, but their campaign was the worst political campaign I had seen in my years as a passionate political observer.”
In sum, Aubrey Norton and his APNU failed to mobilise their supporters, failed to connect with them and failed to convince them that he and the APNU were the right choice for Guyana. In short, (not that they themselves were electable), the AFC were right in their prediction that Aubrey Norton was not electable.
But there is another significantly contributing element to Aubrey Norton’s political demise. I call it the David Hinds factor. Hinds projects himself as a political maestro/strategist. He makes reference to “intellectuals like myself”. He makes a point of noting that certain sections of the Guyanese population deliberately refuse to refer to him as “doctor” or “professor”. These are titles that carry respect, but I believe that because of much of what David Hinds represents, there is little respect for him in Guyana. Hinds’ political strategy is a race-based one for which he offers no apology. I respect his position, but it must of necessity be contrasted with those of other competing political parties, particularly the PPP, that had a broad-based multi-ethnic appeal.
David Hinds declared that APNU should ignore the issue of crossover votes and contended that Indians would vote solidly for the PPP. He urged that we should focus on “our base”. He repeatedly referred to Afro-Guyanese as “our people”. He chastised operatives of political parties who endeavoured to convince Afro-Guyanese to vote for their parties. He referred to such persons as going into “our communities” to influence “our people”. Dennis Wiggins also commented: “Surrogates of the PNC/APNU spent a lot of time chastising African Guyanese who decided to exercise their right to support another political party of their choice…” The APNU, which consists largely of the PNC and the WPA, is an African-centred coalition. Its surrogates raised only concerns and grievances that pertain to African Guyanese interests. It has no messaging or marketing strategy to create a space for disaffected voters of other ethnic groups.”
David Hinds was short-sighted. He showed that he was not such a good intellectual or political strategist after all. His efforts to lay a claim of ownership of the Afro-Guyanese voter did considerable damage to the fortunes of Aubrey Norton and the APNU. David Hinds and his postulations were rejected by those he sought to own in significant numbers.
For those Afro-Guyanese who chose to give their support to the PPP, David Hinds was harsh and unforgiving. He described such persons, exercising their undisputed right to association and free choice, as “lick BT Africans”, “lick bamsi Africans”, and “lick bottom Africans”. Having offered such distasteful and demeaning descriptions to such Afro-Guyanese, Hinds remarked, “I am so ashamed of some of the Black men.” Aubrey Norton did not condemn Hinds for his offensive, insulting, demeaning and degrading remarks to Afro-Guyanese.
David Hinds’ claim that he was engaged in raising the ethnic consciousness of Afro Guyanese was something that was seemingly considered unnecessary, and it is not unreasonable to conclude that Hinds’ efforts were rejected as unappealing, divisive and counter to the ideals and spirit of One Guyana.
On the other hand, David Hinds drove fear into the minds of large numbers of Guyanese, including large numbers of Indo-Guyanese, and in a sense, he helped to consolidate and strengthen the support for the PPP. Consequent upon the riotous and terrifying behaviour of a group of largely Afro-Guyanese young men, following the post-mortem of a young child at the Georgetown hospital which was marked by societal commotion and looting, David Hinds was recorded as saying, “You all are concerned about looting. This story is not about looting. “Our people” last night took control of Guyana. What you all got last night, you all took in you all behind. I am not interested in looters. The looting is not my business. I stand behind them, and I will give them agency.” Those were, by any measure, frightening words for a political aspirant in multi-ethnic Guyana to utter.
Aubrey Norton has now experienced the devastating consequence of political association with David Hinds. The results of the elections equate to a condemnation of the APNU’s association with David Hinds and the WPA and their overly race-based politics. For this reason, if Norton stopped for a moment to reflect, he would undoubtedly realise that the 2025 election results for the APNU are not implausible. The conclusion relating to Aubrey Norton is best captured in the words of Guyanese social and political commentator Freddie Kissoon, who wrote recently, “Perhaps, at no time in the history of this country has one person so damaged a national political party as what Norton did to the PNC in 2025.”

Yours sincerely,
Selwyn Persaud