Ravi Dev attributes failure of PCD negations to the WPA and ignores it was the PPP that unilaterally ended the talks

Sep 26, 2010 Letters

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Dear Editor,
I fully appreciate Mr. Ravi Dev’s response to my letter “Dev is conveniently engaging in outright lies and sensationalism” (Kaieteur News, 9-12-10). I believe it is an important development and a lesson to other writers when Dev demonstrated in his response that he was not prepared to hide behind the defence made on his behalf by his friend and comrade Vishnu Bisram, “dev is not inaccurate on collapse of PCD talks” (Kaieteur News, September 14, 2010).
Whatever one may think about Dev, exchanges with him are always very interesting and informative. This is the case even when he is consciously striking below the belt as he did in his column “Political Hypocrisy” and as he has also done in his recent “Political Omniscience and Hubris” (Kaieteur News, September 19, 2010).
My first point is that nothing Dev has said in ‘Political Omniscience and Hubris’ justified his contention that the WPA in the PCD negotiations, demanded that the PPP accept a minority position in a unified PCD slate. Dev had agued that WPA’s position was based on the misconceived premise that the party had overcome racial voting. In order to disprove Dev’s contention it is Important that readers be advised of the dynamics/nuances which were present during those discussions.
I submit here that those discussions were in two phases. The first was characterized by the WPA’s proposals that the PCD enter the elections in alliance with other non PCD groups/forces. The second phase was characterized by discussions on a slate of only PCD parties. This later stage began sometime after Guard (a non PCD group} publicly announced its choice for presidential candidate. At the time Guard made its announcement all of the parties in the PCD were united in the view that Guard’s intervention and timing were intended to sabotage the PCD discussions.  I wish to reiterate that it was only after Guard’s announced its preferred presidential candidate that the PCD shifted its focus to a pure PCD slate.
The WPA proposal cited by Dev called for the slate to be represented thus: “…50% should go to Civic Groups and 50% to the four (remaining} parties in the PCD”. The 12% break down to each of the PCD parties is of Dev’s imagination. It certainly was not embodied in the WPA proposal as he claimed. Incidentally, Dev’s maths don’t add up 12 by 4 is 48. What happened to the remaining 2%? WPA’s proposal was based on a desire to have the widest possible unity against the regime to meet anticipated and unanticipated challenges before and after the elections. It had nothing to do as was suggested by Dev, to our misreading of the ethnic equation (my word} or to the claim he alleges that WPA had made that it had the support to the majority of voters. WPA was more concerned with finding the best method to confront the regime and creating a good post election climate to facilitate the effectiveness of the new government. Most of these considerations were carried over to the second phase of the talks, with the difference being that while in the first phase WPA was seeking equality between the PCD block and the non PCD forces, in the second phase WPA sought to prevent the PPP’s denomination of the slate which it felt was not good for the country and the new politics which the WPA was struggling to build.
Dev also referred to what he called the PPP’s last proposal “40% PPP: 30% WPA: 20% DLM:  10% combined list”. The intention by Dev was to convey to readers the erroneous impression that this was the last one put by the PPP at the time the negations finally adjourned – not so. The above was probably the PPP’s last proposal in the first phase of the talks. Dev cited the writings of Dr Cheddi Jagan and historian Dr. Odeen Ishmael as the sources he relied on. He conceded that the two named persons were both PPP members who had access to the official records. The brilliant academic and keen politician Ravi Dev must know that access to official records does not necessarily mean presenting them accurately and honestly. I am surprised that Dev did not question what was meant by “combined list.” In the context of the first phase of the PCD’s discussions/negotiations its only reference was to the non PCD parties. My contention is that the proposal referred to by Dev was not put in the second phase of the negations, neither was it the last proposal from the PPP at the time the talks adjourned. My point is neither of the two proposals cited by Dev i.e. WPA’s and the PPP’s, was on the table when the talks began in earnest to reach agreement on a unify slate of PCD parties.
Another disagreement I have with Dev is the fact that he attributed the failure of the PCD negations solely to the WPA and ignored the known fact that it was Dr. Jagan and the PPP that unilaterally ended the talks after they had agreed to its resumption at the end of the bilaterals which were taking place between parties. It can be said that the WPA was responsible for the talks being deadlocked because we held fast to our opposition to Dr. Jagan’s presidential candidacy, But for him to attribute the failure of the talks solely to the WPA is unfair, since we were committed to reaching agreement when the negations resumed. It was well known that WPA’s executive had changed its position on the PPP leader being the acceptable presidential candidate of the PCD slate. This has been in the public domain for many years yet Dev mischievously chose to ignore this fact.
Dev also mentioned a 1991 SN interview with Dr. Clive Thomas, WPA’s Presidential Candidate in the 1992 elections when Dr. Thomas was alleged to have said that the party “I really feel that the party will do exceptionally well in this election…even me who is considered the most pessimistic of the leadership in the party about our prospects.” So well, in fact because of “multi-racial support”. At best this is evidence that the WPA felt that it would do extremely well in the 92 elections. Dev said that Thomas revealed that the WPA was approached by Guard, and went on to infer that our refusal to ally with that organisation meant that we believed that the WPA will win the elections – not so Mr. Dev. There were many reasons for the WPA not to have allied itself with Guard which I will not go into here. You have conveniently failed to address any of those reasons, which you are aware of, preferring as usual to put your own spin on things in your ongoing efforts to pillory the WPA. Dev also quoted from a WPA release dated 9-23-92 two weeks before the elections: “To All Candidates and WPA Members”, the WPA declared, “We are smelling victory, we now have to ensure that we keep it that way.” What is wrong with that? Is it not a legitimate position of each contesting party in an election process to declare confidence in its ability to win? As leader of ROAR when that party contested the 2001 elections did you not express confidence in doing well? And was not the position the same when you aligned with GAP to contest in 2006? WPA’s declaration of smelling victory is the position it developed long after the PCD talks ended and parties were separately contesting the elections, For Dev to insist that WPA took the same attitude to the PCD negations is far from the truth.
In closing, let me reiterate that the WPA’s attitude in the PCD negations was far more complex than Dev has suggested. The party executive had never at any stage premised its approach to the PCD talks on the belief that we had the majority of votes in the country or that we had overcome racial voting. We wanted not only the defeat of the PNC at the 1992 elections but most of all we wanted to see the birth of a new politics.
Tacuma Ogunseye

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