Today’s the deadline for the Opposition parties PNC and AFC to decide on a “consensus” candidate to take on the PPP at the elections due latest by November this year. Now the fact that they’ve already conceded there’s a need for such an arrangement – as was the case in 2015 when they won the elections after spending twenty-three years in the political wilderness – would make you think they’d see the big picture, innit? Which is – to state the obvious – give them the best chances of winning power – which politics is all about – by taking over the government from the PPP and – as they claim – do better!!
But here we are and the two of them are as far apart as they ever were. So once again your Eyewitness asks, “What’s REALLY going on here?” Whenever folks are doing something that makes no sense to you, it means you gotta figure out what makes sense to THEM to behave the way they do. Well, on this, you gotta give the leader of the PNC credit for being quite up front as to why he feels he’s the best person to lead any opposition coalition. He’s using the same logic that underlies the entire democratic process: he who has the largest number of followers has first dibs on taking leadership in coalitions!
Back in 1964 – after the first elections under PR – this was the reason why Dr Jagan – and most observers – insist he was OUSTED from office. His PPP had received the largest number of votes among the three parties contesting the elections – PPP, PNC and UF. Yet the British offered the choice of forming the government to the PNC – which they promptly did with the UF. That the UF might’ve refused a coalition with the PPP is irrelevant – in a democratic system the largest party gets first dibs on forming the govt!!
In Guyana, without having the courage to say it explicitly, the AFC believes that a combined Opposition under Norton can’t defeat the PPP. And why?…since one can assume he’ll at least get the support of PNC supporters?? The brutal truth is that – going all the way back to the 1950s – some politicians fission the Opposition votes into two blocks – African and Coloured Guyanese, and insist that Norton, who’s African to the bone, ain’t suave enough – phenotypically or sociologically – to bring along the Coloured elements!!
But the fact that the two Coloured candidates touting themselves as suitable to replace Norton reveals how they see African Guyanese. THEY as Coloureds can get African Guyanese votes – but Norton as African can’t get Coloured votes!! This exposes the backwardness that still permeates Guyanese politics.
And we still haven’t discussed where in that scheme of things are the other Guyanese groups!!
to the PNC
The new Oscar-nominated movie on Bob Dylan which your Eyewitness just viewed – “A Complete Unknown” – reminds us of his classic ballad “Blowin’ in the wind” This, to your Eyewitness, exemplifies Norton’s predicament, which ain’t one of his making. Dylan asks in his plaintive voice, “How many roads must a man walk down/ Before you call him a man?” And Norton gotta be asking what else must he do to be seen a capable of leading Guyana.
He’s been in politics since he was a boy – in the PNC youth group, the YSM. He then qualified himself to serve quite credibly in the Foreign Service Ministry – which was one way to earn entry into the Coloured elite. But he refused to affect their faux Oxbridge intonations, and led PNC street protests. So while he gave the party street cred to take on the PPP in office, it solidified the Coloured contempt for the “African rabble”!!
And Norton’s swingin’ in the wind!!
…American standards
We’re told Heroes Highways complied with “the rigid pavement design of the standards of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials handbook”. And the China Railway First Group Company built a $1Billion portion.
A US-China “concussion” collaboration?
