WPA admits it is now without parliamentary representation

…as Sarabo-Halley now among APNU MPs

Opposition Leader Joseph Harmon has defended the inclusion of former Working People’s Alliance (WPA) executive member Tabitha Sarabo-Halley on the list of coalition Parliamentarians, notwithstanding the withdrawal of her party from the coalition and her own subsequent resignation.

Harmon was asked about Halley on Tuesday during the first sitting of the 12th Parliament, and he said Sarabo-Halley’s name was extracted as an A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) Member of Parliament (MP), not as a WPA MP.
Harmon noted that she was therefore recognised by the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) as part of the wider APNU/AFC slate. It was on this basis that her name was sent to the National Assembly to form part of the parliamentary contingent.

“Mrs Sarabo-Halley is on a list that was submitted to GECOM. She is part of a list, APNU/AFC. We did not have a specific list called WPA, PNC (People’s National Congress) or whatever,” Harmon explained to the media. “So, she was extracted from that list, and it is based on her submission to GECOM as part of that list, it is based on that that she was extracted. So we believe she is in her rightful place in Parliament.”

WPA admits
Meanwhile, WPA Secretary Tacuma Ogunseye, in a brief interview with this publication, admitted that former Chairperson Sarabo-Halley’s decision to leave the party, and the events thereafter, mean the party is now without parliamentary representation.
Sarabo-Halley’s selection for Parliament by APNU/AFC played a critical role in the WPA’s fallout with its coalition partner last month. In a letter announcing the party’s decision to leave the coalition, Ogunseye had criticised the lack of consultation. According to Ogunseye, Sarabo-Halley was selected without any consultation with the WPA.
“To our utter embarrassment, not for the first time, the WPA was informed by the media that APNU had decided on its representatives for the next National Assembly. It was only after we sent a letter to you enquiring about the state of affairs that we were informed by the General Secretary of the PNCR (Amna Ally), that the Chairperson of the WPA is one of the selected persons,” Ogunseye had written at the time.

“This, of course, was done without any engagement with WPA, thus denying the party an opportunity to determine who its representative should be. We view this as uncomradely, disrespectful, insulting, a gross disregard for principle, and therefore unacceptable,” he had also written.
In the letter, Ogunseye explained that the WPA requested that the names of its two nominees for Parliament and the Region Four Regional Democratic Council seats be removed from the APNU list.
It was later revealed that the WPA had expected to get two seats, with each seat being rotated between two persons. Sarabo-Halley was one of four persons shortlisted by the party.
Soon after the WPA broke away from APNU/AFC, it was revealed that Sarabo-Halley herself had resigned from the WPA.
In its letter, the WPA had also laid out the conditions for reconciliation with the APNU/AFC. These conditions had included the WPA being granted the right to choose who it will send to Parliament, and that the recommendations of the Corbin Report be implemented.
At the time, the WPA had stipulated that these conditions must be met within the next two months in order for it to reconsider its decision to leave. When asked by this publication whether the APNU/AFC had reached out to his party, however, Ogunseye said that it was “early days yet.” (G3)