The reasons why the Coalition lost the 2020 elections

Aug 08, 2021 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Kaieteur News – In 2015, the APNU+AFC secured a lead of 5,314 votes over its nearest rival the PPP/C and by only 2,432 votes over the combined totals of all the Opposition parties. This allowed it to secure a one-seat majority in the National Assembly.
In 2020, the APNU+AFC lost to the PPP/C by 15,416 votes. In addition, it secured 28,703 votes less than the combined Opposition parties did.
How does one account for this loss of support by the APNU+AFC?
The first major contributor was the financial policies, which were pursued. One of the things, which people dislike, is when money is taken out of their pockets. The APNU+AFC foisted a number of new taxes on citizens. But the more dumb-headed of these taxes were those, which were placed on water and electricity and on private education. These were highly unpopular policies, which cost the Coalition votes.
The Coalition also aggravated key constituencies such as the Disciplined Services. They withheld the annual bonus, which the PPP/C had paid for years. Public servants were granted an across the board bonus of $50,000 which was then slashed to $25,000 and then cut-out all together. These are not measures, which attract voter support and would have resulted in some loss of confidence in the APNU+AFC.
The second major fallout was the ignoring of the private sector. While some tax concessions were granted, the private sector was not treated as an ally of development. The private sector likes to be given attention and likes to be in the limelight. The Coalition cared little about the private sector and this cost them key financial support going into the elections.
The third major mistake was the decision to close sugar estates. The Coalition did not do a proper accounting of the costs and benefits of this measure. It placed more than 7,000 workers on the breadline and then created even more consternation by paying them their severance in piece-meal fashion.
What made the decision even more bizarre was that the Commission of Inquiry into the Sugar Industry did not make such a recommendation. As a consequence, the opponents of the government capitalised on this mistake by presenting it as a vindictive policy. The APNU+AFC also failed to realise that some 25 percent of the workforce of the sugar company were persons of African-descent – a group that has overwhelmingly supported the PNC/R, the main partner in the Coalition.
The fourth mistake concerned the handling of the Coalition. The internal dynamics of the coalition politics was mishandled. The WPA complained early about not being consulted and not being part of the decision making of the Coalition. The decision to remove Dr. Rupert Roopnarine, long seen as an architect of the Coalition, was disturbing particularly given the reasons given.
The AFC had important ministries but its authority was often overridden. A case in point was the decision to replace the former acting Commissioner of Police, David Ramnarine, who was sent on leave and then superseded as Commissioner of Police, effectively ending this man’s policing career. This decision did not appear to enjoy the full support of a key AFC big-wig.
Given the manner in which it was treated, distrust developed within the AFC, which weakened that party. A study of the facial expressions of some AFC parliamentarians suggested that some of them were not entirely taken by surprise by the support given by Charandas Persaud to the no-confidence vote in December 2018.
This led of course to all kinds of political and legal absurdities. The Coalition’s take on what constitutes a majority must go down as the joke of the century and it made the government look extremely ridiculous.
The AFC suffered the most from this fallout. They underperformed during the elections’ campaign and it was their failure to hold their base, which was partly responsible for the Coalition’s loss.
To add to the AFC’s problems, there was an internal and ill-advised power struggle for the post of Prime Minister. The public interpreted this as naked greed for power and this would have forced many of the AFC’s supporters to want to distance themselves from the Coalition.
But perhaps the most damaging indictment against the Coalition was the signing of the Production Sharing Agreement with ExxonMobil, Hess and CNOOC. The Coalition was far from transparent in this matter and when the contract was made public, there were strong condemnation of its terms. It was perhaps the single biggest mistake ever made in this country’s history and one, which contributed, in no small measure to the undoing of the APNU+AFC.
The Coalition lost the elections. But the greater loss was the loss-of-face, which occurred when it attempted the extraordinary feat of converting a loss into victory.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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