Latest update April 24th, 2026 12:40 AM
I hope Raphael Trotman does not disappoint this nation
My political culture is Rodneyite. It was influenced by the praxis of Walter Rodney and the Working People’s Alliance (WPA). From that experience then, I espouse the concept of rotational leadership. It was an indelible motif on the body of the WPA. The WPA never had a long-serving leader even when Walter Rodney’s charisma was nationally pervasive. From the time of its formation until its days of ebbing, the WPA never had a single leader.
WPA’s rotational leadership culture had a number of advantages. First, it was deliberately designed to be a break with the monstrous tradition of the PNC and PPP where the Leviathan figure prevailed, meaning that one person became the enduring leader.
Secondly, it offered the possibility of the dissolution of power instincts. This meant that the constant change of the leader would deny the emergence and concretization of obsession with power.
Thirdly, it allowed those at the apex of an organization to be exposed to the process of leadership at the top.
The WPA’s rotational operation was a huge success in breaking with the politics of the past. It remains today, a hallmark of Caribbean politics. When the Alliance For Change was born it adopted the rotational tradition no doubt copied from the WPA. The shape at that time was that Raphael Trotman would be the leader and the party’s presidential candidate.
After its parliamentary life was over, Khemraj Ramjattan would succeed Trotman and be the 2011 presidential candidate. It would appear that there are voices within the AFC that want a change of the original constitution.
From what I have ascertained, Trotman backers have argued that the AFC got six seats that came from constituencies that voted for the man, Trotman, and his politics and therefore Ramjattan didn’t bring anything to the table. This scenario is partly true and partly false. A thorough examination of the election results, poll station by poll station, revealed that at least enough Indians voted to give the AFC a seat. But the statistics are irrefutable that the AFC’s votes came from predominantly African-Guyanese.
It would appear that there is a fear among Trotman backers that the AFC would be devastated if Ramjattan receives the leader’s chair because he will not bring in Indian votes.
There are a plethora of problems with those assumptions. First, if that argument has validity then all the Trotman backers want is to retain their minority status. They are saying that they should stick with Trotman and get African votes. Well if the AFC gets every single African vote in Guyana it will not win the election. It needs cross-votes from other ethnic communities. Read that to mean Indians.
Here now is my argument about the AFC’s electoral prospects in 2011.
I believe that given the alienation of African Guyanese in this country, given the massive discrimination they have faced from the PPP Government and the Jagdeo presidency, they will vote for the major opposition parties. With a destructive implosion within the PNC that will take long to heal and maybe not in time for the election, Africans are likely to move towards the AFC.
My belief is that whether there is an Indian or an African head of the AFC, it will get African votes because African people do not perceive the AFC as an exclusive Indian party or an Indianized organization. This is where Ramjattan comes in. It is my contestation that given the absolute evil that has overtaken the PPP, Indians are looking for an alternative. They will have to face a choice of a PNC with Winston Murray or an AFC with Ramjattan.
I feel most sincerely that an AFC with a Ramjattan presidency stands a greater chance of attracting Indian votes. This is the brutal reality of Guyanese politics. It is not nice. It is sad. But this is our tragic reality. If we go the electoral route in 2011, if we accept electoral politics in 2011 and if we are to defeat the PPP at that poll, there has to be crossover votes from Indians around the vicinity of 15 percent. I honestly think this can be done by Murray but more importantly by Ramjattan. African intellectuals and African politicians may feel disgusted with this configuration and I feel so myself as a Guyanese nationalist, but this is our history never mind it is unwholesome, this is our reality. I would urge Trotman to stick with the original route when the AFC was born.
I would also urge the AFC to pursue coalition politics urgently.
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