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Sharma’s Justice for All Party says membership in coalition ‘under review’
– Following exclusion from Parliament by Granger
By Kemol King
JFAP Leader, Chandra Narine Sharma and General Secretary, Savitree Singh-Sharma
The Justice for All Party (JFAP) is actively reconsidering its place in the coalition, General Secretary, Savitree Singh-Sharma told Kaieteur News yesterday, following a release of a list of opposition Members of Parliament (MPs) from which the party was excluded.
The participation of small parties in A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) has come sharply into focus following former President and APNU Leader David Granger’s comments last week that he would not be allowing ‘cardboard’ cutout parties into Parliament. Granger’s People’s National Congress combined with the Working People’s Alliance, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), Guyana Action Party (GAP) and JFAP to form APNU since 2011. Only PNC and WPA are represented on the APNU 22-member component of the 31-member APNU+AFC parliamentary list.
While calls to NDA and GAP leaders were unsuccessful, Kaieteur News was able to contact Singh and her husband, Chandra Narine Sharma, founder of JFAP. Singh told this newspaper JFAP did indeed propose its own representation on the coalition’s list, but that “We were left out.”
She said that the party even at times attempted to make contact with the coalition’s leadership, but was not fortunate to get responses. Asked why JFAP was left out, Singh said “Only Mr. Granger can answer that.”
She however later said that she supposes JFAP was left out because it “spoke out against the obvious wrongdoings that were happening” during the elections.
During the protracted electoral process, the coalition had tried unsuccessfully to discredit elections it had lost,openly endorsed a proposal that a declaration be made on the basis of fraudulent results, and repeatedly went to court to frustrate a lawful declaration of the recount results. JFAP was the only constituent party of APNU+AFC to call on the coalition leader, David Granger to concede. When those concerns were brought to Granger by the press, he had said that he had no record of them being expressed.
Following the eventual declaration and swearing in of the new President, Granger decided that the constituents of the coalition, now in opposition, would have to earn their places in Parliament.
“Not fake parties, not cardboard parties,” Granger had said.
The rules Granger set out seemed to rule out all of the smaller parties, yet, the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) managed to secure a spot with its executive member and former Minister of Public Service, Tabitha Sarabo-Halley being given a parliamentary seat. When the other small parties remained quiet, WPA leadership had stood in open solidarity with the coalition during the elections.
Singh explained that, with all that has happened, “We don’t know which way the party is headed, or if we are included,” and that that is why JFAP’s place in the coalition is under review.
Following the 2011 elections, CN Sharma’s son, Jaipaul Sharma had represented JFAP in Parliament as part of the APNU list in opposition. Then, when APNU coalesced with AFC and won the 2015 elections, the young Sharma went on to serve as Junior Minister of Finance portfolio, before being moved last year as Junior Minister of Public Infrastructure.
By January 2020, it was announced that younger Sharma had left JFAP to join the PNC, and was included on the coalition list for the latter party.
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