Latest update April 26th, 2026 12:45 AM
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The Crown Prince?
With the PNC’s presidential candidate process out of the way, all eyes have turned towards the other elephant in the room – the PPP. As was reported, that party has taken the less public road – never mind the protestations about furthering democracy in the land – by confining the deliberations and confabulations behind closed doors.
The PPP fifteen-member Executive Committee (ExCo) would lead an examination of candidates and then submit recommendations to their thirty-five-member Central Committee. There are five declared candidates, but one has declared his dissatisfaction with the secretiveness of the process and refused to jump through the stipulated hoops.
The other four duly submitted their disquisitions on their suitability to lead their party into the hustings against the concededly impressive David Granger of the PNC. The CV’s were presumably digested but there were no reports on their assessments.
However, since the four were subsequently asked to detail their responses to a host of pressing issues, one may presume that the original resumes might have been a bit too self-serving – as resumes do tend to be. Earlier in the year, there was some talk that the PPP might want to wrap up its presidential selection in time to announce the winner at the party’s March 6 Babu John ceremony commemorating the death of its iconic founder-leader Dr. Cheddi Jagan, but this was not to be.
We still have no word about the present status of the PPP process, save that it is still open. However there is a new development that suggests the delay might not just be on account of sifting through the astoundingly abstruse responses of the four candidates.
Mr Robert Persaud, Minister of Agriculture and Central Committee member has, for all intents and purposes, thrown his hat into the ring. This might have thrown the entire process for a loop. For years it was expected that Mr Persaud was going to be seeking the presidency but even as it seemed to come down to the wire, he demurred.
To the surprise of many, Mr Persaud hinted that he simply wanted to serve in his present capacity. Most observers concluded that the energetic and very youthful Minister was certainly not suffering from doubts about his suitability for the top spot but was merely biding his time, as he acquired more experience, for a subsequent run.
Last week, there was the first hint that this run might be sooner than he had let on.
He revealed that he was under some pressure from some constituents to make his bid in the present go around. This Monday he was somewhat more specific.
In a statement to the media, he expressed, “appreciation to all those, particularly the youth of Guyana, who have offered words of encouragement and who have gone as far as suggesting that I consider running for higher office.” This time he did not unequivocally demur: “I remain… willing to serve in whatever capacity the people, our party, and government so desire.”
Mr. Persaud’s invocation of the call of youths to suggest why he may become a candidate for the PPP’s presidential candidacy is evocative of the dynamics that propelled the incumbent President Jagdeo into the position over the much older and experienced party stalwarts.
Mr Jagdeo was then touted as the youthful answer to the PNC’s old and grizzled Mr. Desmond Hoyte. Mr. Persaud can presumably make the same claim – in even stronger terms: In the absence of a Jagan, the PPP’s candidate must be sharply distinguishable from the PNC’s Granger, cast in the mould of the discredited sixties and seventies.
His disability however would be a cynical one. It was long rumoured that he would eventually run – as a stalking horse for Mr Jagdeo who, while Constitutionally barred from running for a third term, is “constitutionally” driven to retain control of a state that he has shaped in his image.
For Mr Persaud’s seemingly imminent candidacy to be taken seriously, he would have to convince not only the Central Committee, but the people of Guyana, that as Mr Jagdeo’s nephew-in-law, he would not be just a pawn to another’s ambition.
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