PPP’s presidential prospects make submissions to Party Executive

– as deliberations to choose final candidate expected in coming days

As the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) moves closer towards identifying their presidential candidate to contest General and Regional Elections due in March, at least five members made their case in presentations before the Party’s Executive during last week.
Reports reaching Guyana Times indicate that the five PPP Members of Parliament who appeared before the Party Executives were Opposition Chief Whip Gail Teixeira; former Attorney General Anil Nandlall; former Housing Minister Irfaan Ali, former Culture, Youth and Sport Minister, Dr Frank Anthony; and Dr Vindhya Persaud.
This publication understands that with these five presidential candidate contenders having made their presentations, the Party Executives will be meeting in the coming days to review the submissions before voting takes place.
There has been much public discussion about some of these very contenders as potential PPP presidential candidates ever since the coalition Government fell to a no-confidence vote on December 21, thus having to call elections within 90 days from that date as per the Constitution.
The presidential candidate race began after the No-confidence Motion brought by the parliamentary Opposition – the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) – against the Government succeeded when Charrandas Persaud, a former Alliance For Change (AFC) parliamentarian, broke rank and made a conscience vote in favour of the motion.
Article 106 (6) of the Constitution states: “The Cabinet including the President shall resign if the Government is defeated by the vote of a majority of all the elected members of the National Assembly on a vote of confidence.”
Meanwhile, clause 7 goes on to state that “Notwithstanding its defeat, the Government shall remain in office and shall hold an election within three months, or such longer period as the National Assembly shall by resolution supported by not less than two-thirds of the votes of all the elected members of the National Assembly determine, and shall resign after the President takes the oath of office following the election.”
With the passage of the no-confidence vote against the Government, the main political parties have either begun or intensified the task of identifying a presidential candidate.
PPP General Secretary, Bharrat Jagdeo has been careful when handling questions about who is likely to emerge as the presidential face of his party. At a press conference soon after the no-confidence vote, Jagdeo had affirmed that the Party remained committed to the highest levels of transparency, accountability, and democracy as it undertook the process of selecting its next presidential nominee.
Jagdeo had also assured that the race for the candidacy was open, as this has been a longstanding practice of the PPP. He had however reminded that the votes mustered from the 35 Central Committee members will matter in the democratic process.
Jagdeo had also noted that his party has a history of using secret ballots. He pointed out that when this was not done, it was for a good reason. As it stands now, Jagdeo explained that secret ballots would only be used if there is more than one final candidate.