Granger has been dethroned in the PNC: Four Incidents

May 09, 2020 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Four incidents or four situations have proven that David Granger has lost power to make decisions for the government and the PNC. Leadership in Guyana has always existed within the framework of one man domination.
From the time the PPP broke up with Forbes Burnham forming the PNC, leadership of political parties have the shape of a one-man hegemony. Whoever the party leader wants to have or wants removed, there can be no challenge.
Cheddi Jagan conspiring with his wife removed or elevated whoever he wanted. At congressional voting, Jagan would decide who he wants to see in the hierarchy. Ironically, because of his pacifist temperament Jagan would face stiff confrontations and would not retaliate. But not Mrs. Jagan. From the time Jagan died, his wife ruled the PPP with an iron fist that exceeded Burnham’s role in the PNC.
Smaller parties that came after the PPP and PNC were born into the culture of one-man control. From Peter D’Aguiar’s United Force right through to the AFC, the leader decides everything for the party. Perhaps the largest manifestation of one-man dictatorship in the history of political parties was Desmond Hoyte. Bharrat Jagdeo is running second to Hoyte but factually, Jagdeo never attempted to do in the PPP what Hoyte did in the PNC.
Hoyte took over the government and PNC after Burnham died and what he did is yet to be recorded either in book form or on video. It remains one of the strongest cases in the post-colonial Third World where a party leader virtually dethroned his party’s hierarchy.
So extensive was Hoyte’s purging that he succeeded in expelling the third most powerful PNC monarch after Burnham and Ptolemy Reid. Hoyte removed Hamilton Green who at the time had the most extensive contacts with ordinary PNC supporters. Hoyte’s reach among PNC grass-root supporters were virtually non-existent yet he magically decapitated Green.
There is a story yet to be told of how solid is one-man dictatorship in the culture of political parties in Guyana. After Hoyte invented “slo fyaah/mo fyaah,” the consensus in the PNC was that the PPP regime was under extensive strain that the PNC should push for inclusive governance and reject President Jagdeo’s overture of what is now recorded as “The National Dialogue.”
Hoyte felt that there was political mileage to be got from “The National Dialogue” and did not accept the other configuration that the PNC wanted. One person in the PNC leadership actually plotted to remove Hoyte by violent means but Hoyte out manoeuvred him. I cannot name him. As I wrote countless time; I don’t have time to defend foolish libel writs.
The strongest clue I would offer is to say that he was very close to the violent man in the PNC- Andy Gouveia. It was Gouveia and this “gentleman” who arranged the fire-bombing of channel 69 building on Brickdam during “slo fyaah/mofyaah.” We come now to a phenomenal exception of one-man hegemony inside political parties from the fifties onwards – the fall of David Granger inside the PNC from March 2020.
How did Hoyte manage to defeat the coup plotters inside the PNC while he was president and not Granger? Firstly, Hoyte had international support for his IMF-backed programmes so he had an international base. Secondly, Hoyte had removed key plotters long before he settled with Jimmy Carter so they were not around to plan their coup in 1991. Thirdly, Hoyte was an extremely popular president after his transformation and would have received solid support from the entire country if the coup plotters had moved against him. Fourthly, Hoyte spent decades in the PNC leadership so he had factions supporting him.
Space has run out to make a comparison with Granger but what I would ask readers to do is to look at the four factors favouring Hoyte. They explain why Granger fell in the PNC because he didn’t have those four fulcrums. I end with four incidents that reveal that the coup plotters have defeated Granger both in government and the PNC.
One- Granger had no say in the removal of Carl Greenidge. Greenidge was targeted because of an incident and his ouster was demanded; Granger could not stop the demand. Two- the conspirators were livid that Granger arranged for a CARICOM presence in the recount. In fact, the conspirators accused Granger of not consulting the party’s leadership.
Three- Granger knew it was complete contempt for him when the JJ&B contract was initiated without his knowledge. He reacted furiously but he cannot banish the plotters. Finally, it was not President Granger that ordered the rejection of the Carter Centre return. Granger cannot reverse it despite American high level request. He is ordered not to.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)