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Is the PNC slowly taking over the PPP?

Nov 28, 2011 Letters

Dear Editor,
I have been mulling this thought over since the campaign season started and the former PNC-ites shifted to the PPP. Is the PNC slowly taking over the PPP? If the PPP is to win the polls, what does this mean for the future of the PPP?
A lot of PNC-ites have migrated to the PPP under Jagdeo. With Jagdeo dominating Ramotar, this trend is likely to continue if the PPP wins.
These former PNC-ites did not come cheap. The PPP has given up a lot in power, prestige, positions and lucrative salaries to reward these individuals who spent most of their life battling the PPP only to show up at the eleventh hour and be richly rewarded.
Odinga Lumumba, Kwame McKoy and others come to mind. Recent additions to the PPP like former House of Israelite, Joseph Hamilton and Phillip Bynoe, Frederick McWilfred and Gillian Burton will also have to be handsomely rewarded.
What does the rank and file PPP supporter think of this? From a pure vote getting dynamic, these former PNC-ites bring nothing to the PPP in terms of crossover PNC votes.
At the end of the day, this is just another opportunity for these former PNC-ites to improve their personal lot by drinking from the trough. It is a good gig though to just show up at the last minute and get the whole hog.
This PPP practice of inviting former PNC-ites and handing them juicy positions is shallow. If the PPP is looking for ethnic balance, there are many quality African individuals who are better than the lot that moved to the PPP from the PNC since Jagdeo was President.
Maybe the PPP targets these PNC-ites for joining them to suggest that the PPP is weakening the PNC. If so, this makes no sense since the PPP and every rational Guyanese knows the PNC cannot ever win another democratic election in a racially polarized Guyana.
Further, the PNC has happily told the PPP thanks for taking its old baggage and deadweight. I see the trend continuing as more PNC-ites will be recruited by the PPP if it wins.
The PPP is losing people (Nagamootoo for example) as no one wants to join the cabal of corruption. So, it will take what it gets as replacement or by recruitment, even if it is from the PNC.
More PNC-ites in the decision-making and influence-peddling chain in the PPP means more and stronger influence by former PNC-ites within the PPP.
More PNC-ites in the PPP’s decision-making chain will attract more PNC-ites to the PPP.
The growing presence and influence of the PNC-ites in the PPP will cause more PNC-ites to go over to the PPP. After all, this is former PNC-ites like Kwame McKoy and Odinga Lumumba telling Jagdeo who to bring into the power fold.
Will the PPP of Jagdeo become more like the PNC? Well, it is already virtually there. The PNC’s takeover of the PPP is slowly taking place in spirit and practice as the evidence of corruption, internal party dictatorship, wrongdoing, abuse, waste and mismanagement have proven. Former PNC-ites have gained credible influence within the PPP. There is nothing to suggest it will not continue.
M. Maxwell

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