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Change this undemocratic procedure
Dear Editor,
On 23rd September, the Executive of the PPP issued a media release published in the newspapers, whereby it declared it would follow the procedure wherein the Central Committee of the Party (approximately 30 persons) chooses and approves the PPP’s presidential candidate.
The choice of these 30 persons would then be announced to the general party membership who would have had no say, as is their democratic right of deciding who should be their presidential candidate. Like robots, the membership of the party will have to accept the 30 persons chosen.
The media release mentioned that that was the procedure used in the choice of Dr Cheddi Jagan, Mrs Janet Jagan and Dr Jagdeo as presidential candidates. The media release failed to say that none of the five or six presidential hopefuls has the stature, charisma and acceptability of these outstanding persons whom everyone respected and accepted.
In addition, the procedure used in the time of Dr and Mrs Jagan and their protégé, Dr Jagdeo was simply because they were the unanimous choices of the party membership and they had no challengers. In the time of Dr Jagan, Mrs Jagan and Dr Jagdeo, the party groups countrywide quietly expressed their concurrence previous to public announcement. (Historically, this undemocratic procedure was put into place as a temporary measure when the PPP was in danger of being proscribed and may have had to go underground. The danger has long passed and the democratic procedure should immediately be re-established.)
Now, unlike in the days of the Jagans, there are five or six presidential aspirants, each with his own following among the membership. The 30 persons of the Central Committee are in no position to know who the majority of the membership of the party wants. It is only the membership who could know who they wish to be their presidential candidate; not the 30 denizens of Freedom House.
If this outdated procedure of choosing the presidential candidate, which unfairly favours one person above the others is allowed to persist, the PPP would be further fragmented and eventually disintegrate in five years.
The answer to this debacle is to democratize the choice of the PPP presidential candidate by allowing the party groups to make their choices. Except democratic procedure is used, large segments of erstwhile PPP supporters would abstain (not vote) in the elections. Those who are in charge of the party seem hell-bent on disintegrating it for their short-term personal gain. The Jagans, from wherever they are, must be looking at the present scenario with deep sorrow.
P. Ramlall
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