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The PNC and elections 2025

Sep 15, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Kaieteur News – There are two important behavioural manifestations of the PNC that need analytical treatment. One is the constant lamentation of the corrupt state since Dr. Ali was sworn in as president in August 2020.

The other is the acceptance of the PNC of an emerging apartheid state in Guyana. Last Monday, the advisor to the Opposition Leader, Mr. Elson Low was the guest on the Gildarie-Freddie Kissoon Show. Mr. Low worked under Dr. Clive Thomas who headed the State Assets Recovery Agency (SARA).

Mr. Low said he thinks SARA managed to facilitate into the court system 20 cases of corruption. But when asked to discuss them, he cited two only – GBTI charged with money laundering and the Pradoville 2 scheme.

I told Mr. Low that both cases were high profile situations and the world knew about them. What the world needs to have is information on what other findings SARA made. Mr. Low said he cannot discuss SARA’s confidential documents.

I indicated to Mr. Low that I find it strange Dr. Thomas has been writing a weekly column since his party, APNU, lost power but he has completely eschewed the topic of his discoveries when he headed SARA. I will connect the importance of the silence about SARA’s findings, if any, with the PNC’s campaign in 2025 but let’s move on to the apartheid state.

I was the guest yesterday on the Naim Chan Morning Show on CNS channel 6. Mr. Chan asked what do I think of the claim of the Opposition that an apartheid state is emerging in this country. I debunked the citation of a nascent apartheid system but also told Chan that such demagoguery will damage the PNC in 2025. I will expand below.

What is the connection of the claim of Guyana becoming an apartheid state and the silence of exposing what SARA found and how are those two issues related to what will happen in 2025. The connection is Dr. Clive Thomas.

Dr. Thomas headed SARA.  And he was listed as one of the speakers at the Zoom programme that will describe the coming apartheid system in Guyana. The analysis is that come election time in 2025 both themes are going to hurt the PNC electorally.

I did tell Chan for the purpose of political reality, I will only refer to the PNC only as the opposition because I think AFC is literally dead. For the purpose of this column, I will refer to the Opposition to mean the PNC.

The two rallying cries in 2025 by the PNC will be corruption and the apartheid system. I told Chan both are going to hurt the PNC’s electoral prospects and badly. You have PNC leaders on the pulpit in 2025 speaking about ubiquitous corruption but cannot tell the nation what SARA found.

You have an opposition figure like Dr. Thomas describing an apartheid system but he cannot discuss the role state corruption played in the birth of apartheid. This has to play into the hands of the ruling party that will accuse the PNC of deceiving voters by their cries of corruption but they have no evidence. Voters will not accept exclamations of corruption and reject the PPP in 2025 if the exclamations cannot be verified by Dr. Thomas, Mr. Low and others.

I told Chan the shouts about apartheid will backfire for the PNC in 2025 because other races will reject those dangerous allegations. I was at pains to explain to Mr. Chan that the Africans constitute 29 percent of the population.

Even if all of them accept that in 2025, Guyana has apartheid, the 71 percent of the nation will reject that nasty claim because they do not see it and they will blame the PNC for whipping up racial hysteria in the election campaign.

Whoever will be advising the PNC in the 2025 election campaign has to be completely incompetent to preserve that twin strategy. Mr. Chan asked me to explain what I will tell the PNC leaders if I had to advise them.

My response came out automatically – reach out to other sections of Guyana and stop carping on race, ethnicity, race, ethnicity and it goes on and on. If you tell Guyanese that Africans are living with apartheid, you are bound to alienate other ethnic communities who will reject you at the poll.

One fundamental reason explains this electoral repudiation. Amerindians and Indians are going to be angry and at the same time hilarious. With the police force, army, nursing sector in the public medical system, teachers in the public education sector, and the service sectors in the entire governmental structure consisting of African Guyanese, how can you speak about apartheid?

(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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