PPP’s Presidential Candidate

Sep 24, 2010 Editorial

With the return of “free and fair” elections to Guyana, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) won the elections of 1992, 1997, 2001 and 2006. With the opposition forces as fragmented as ever, it is widely perceived by the Guyanese public (if anecdotal evidence and the NACTA polls are to be believed) that the PPP will be returned to office once again in the general elections scheduled for next year.
That circumstance, not surprisingly, has stirred great interest in the identity of the PPP’s next presidential candidate, since the incumbent President could not run for a third term. After all, if the preceding argument is to be accepted, the next candidate would be President – and in the context of Guyana this office looms rather large, to say the least. We refer to a “he” because it does not appear that in this go around there are any females in the running.
The PPP’s procedure for choosing its candidate then, has also received more than its fair share of attention. For the longest while, there was never any question as to who that person would be: the founder-leader of the party was around for almost fifty years. The last challenge to his leadership was in the 1950’s when Forbes Burnham had to resort to suspect manoeuvres that ultimately led to the split of the PPP. Selection of the presidential candidate rather than election is justified by the party’s principle of “democratic centralism”.
The party’s countrywide groups met biennially at Congresses that voted in a 35-member Central Committee which in turn chose a 15-member Executive Committee (Ex-Co) from its own ranks. The smaller Ex-Co makes the day to day decisions on party matters, coordinated by its General Secretary.
For its subsequent delegation of responsibilities and roles, including that of presidential candidates, the Ex-Co would nominate individuals that would have to be finally approved by the Central Committee. Over the last couple years, while there has been intense speculation that President Jagdeo may use available Constitutional provisions and be available once again for the presidential sweepstakes, he has firmly scotched such rumours. During that time several aspirants have thrown their hats in the ring – the Speaker of the House, Mr Ralph Ramkarran, the General Secretary of the PPP, Mr Donald Ramotar, MP Mr Moses Nagamootoo and Minister of Home Affairs, Clement Rohee.
Messrs. Ramkarran and Ramotar have explicitly indicated that they have no problems with the traditional method of selecting the next presidential candidate and while Mr Rohee has not, to the best of our knowledge, pronounced directly on the matter. It would appear that he is also not opposed to it.
Mr Nagamootoo, however, while agreeing that selection of its presidential candidate was an internal party matter, has publicly declared that he would like the process to be more “democratic”; to involve in some way the ordinary PPP party members. In the absence of such a new mechanism, he indicated that he would withdraw from the process.
The PPP has just announced that there will be no innovations and the old methodology will be deployed. It would appear that this leaves Messrs. Ramkarran, Ramotar and Rohee in the race. The handicappers have made the first two the frontrunners and the Ex-Co will have to choose between them.
There is however, another possible scenario, based on the recent history of the PPP on this very issue.
In the run-up to the 1997 elections, with the passing of Dr Jagan, it was reliably reported that there was a deadlock in the Ex-Co between two candidates (Messrs Ramkarran and Nagamootoo). Mrs Jagan was proposed as a compromise candidate, and the rest, as they say, is history. It is possible, therefore that the eventual candidate might be someone other than the present frontrunners. Unless, of course, one is prepared to step aside for the other, to pre-empt such a dark horse. The story is not over. Stay tuned.

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PPP’s Presidential Candidate

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