It is impossible for the Medvedev pendulum to swing in Guyana

Jan 25, 2019 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

In my column of Wednesday, July 11, 2018 with the heading, “There is no longer the Medvedev syndrome in Guyana,” I noted that there are no term limits in Russia. A president can only serve two consecutive terms and return after, a lapse. It meant that Putin had served two terms and had to wait. So Medvedev filled the gap and then Putin came back for another two successive terms 2012 to 2018, 2018 to 2024.
Unless they change the constitution, which Putin is planning to do, he has to skip 2024. This explains the Medvedev syndrome. If Medvedev in 2008 had become his own man as president, the United Russia Party would not have nominated him in 2012, but Putin instead. Putin would have won and would have been angry with Medvedev, no doubt harshly victimizing him.
We don’t have that formula in Guyana. There is a permanent ban on a presidential candidate who served two consecutive terms as head of state. I quote from that July 11, 2018 column; “There is no longer the Medvedev syndrome in Guyana. Here is why. Suppose the PPP wins the presidency in 2020, what fear does the president of the country have of his party leader; in this case Jagdeo? The president is a very powerful figure under the constitution. Every president from Burnham onwards has used the power of his office to reshape his/her political party.”
Suppose Irfaan Ali wins the presidency. He does not have to face Jagdeo returning as president. In the context of Guyanese politics, which differs deeply from many other former British territories, the presidency is not subordinate to the party. Desmond Hoyte created history in the Caricom family when he singlehandedly used the presidency to effect a complete overhaul of the PNC’s leadership.
When Hoyte came to power, he set about removing Burnham’s edifice in the PNC. He dismantled it, not by using party power but state power. The nature of the economy allowed him to do that. With one sweep of the broom, Hoyte removed the entrenched PNC leaders under Burnham. Hoyte as PNC leader was instrumental in expelling one of the constituents of the trio that nurtured the PNC as a party and the PNC as a government – Hamilton Green.
When Roger Luncheon was testifying in Jagdeo’s libel suit against me, he said the first time he knew about Bharrat Jagdeo was after 1993. Yet 10 years after, Jagdeo was in complete control of the PPP. How he did it? He used state power to patronage those in the PPP that were weak financially. He used state power to do what Hoyte did – put the leader’s beneficiaries in the vital organs of the party.
The label of “Jagdeo puppet” that has surfaced worldwide is not fair to Irfaan. If he becomes president, he can only be a puppet of Jagdeo due to deep and essential, self-destructive flaws in his character and personality. In terms of the use of power, he can become his own man and Jagdeo cannot do anything to undermine him.
Jagdeo as leader of the PPP has control of the party and its organs – women arm, youth arm, Rice Producers’ Association, GAWU etc. But state power can confront Jagdeo on that. All Irfaan has to do is study the machinations, conspiracies and stratagems of Hoyte and Jagdeo in reshaping the ruling party. There is nothing unique about what Jagdeo and Hoyte did. This is where the economy comes in.
Throughout the history of the PPP and PNC, its leaders, except for a few lawyers who were in private practice, were not wealthy people, and were not even financially sound in the middle class way of life. Jagan from 1957 to 1964, and again from 1992 to his death, elevated his party people in state jobs. Just one example should suffice; Youth arm leader, Rohan Singh, without any security background whatsoever, became head of presidential security after 1992.
Jagdeo packed the PPP’s central committee with his own people whom he patronized with high salary jobs in the state. Just two examples in this regard; Jennifer Westford was made a Minister and Kwame Mc Coy was presidential press liaison. What barrier stands in the way of Irfaan as president from copying Jagdeo and Hoyte?
Guyana is a poor country with party mandarins – with the exception of The United Force in the sixties and the AFC – being persons of weak financial status. Presidents have continued to use state power to control their parties. What can Jagdeo do if Irfaan breaks away from him? Not a damn thing!

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It is impossible for the Medvedev pendulum to swing in Guyana

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