General Secretary of the Peoples Progressive Party (PPP) Dr Bharrat Jagdeo on Thursday remarked that the AFC and PNC/APNU talks were bound to collapse given that the politicians were only focused on what they can personally gain from another coalition arrangement.
The AFC has announced that it will be contesting the 2025 elections alone, however, it noted that the ‘door is always’ open for a change of this position before Nominations Day.
The AFC and PNC/APNU had been engaged in discussions on a potential coalition for this year’s elections. But AFC’s David Patterson revealed today that the talks failed since the parties were unable to reach a mutually acceptable agreement.
According to Jagdeo, “the fact that they can’t come up with a consensus candidate is largely because they don’t look at what they want to do for the country…they don’t think about ‘let’s come together and create a programme of what we want to do for the people of this country’. Their only order of business…was about who gets what if they win the government.”
Nevertheless, Jagdeo noted that the AFC may eventually run back to the APNU when they realise their lack of support from the electorate.
He also pointed out that both parties have nothing to offer the people of Guyana.
“Nothing about creation of wealth for people, nothing about satisfying the needs of people for housing…[they] have no plan for the future,” he highlighted.
In fact, he said both the AFC and APNU have competence and credibility gaps. Jagdeo explained that they have a competence gap because they have failed to put together a proper plan for the future of the country. He added that they have a credibility gap because even if they make a promise to the electorate, “nobody will believe you will implement it, given your own track record”.
“Nothing they put together will be believable,” he said.
Additionally, Jagdeo noted that the AFC and PNC/APNU have a divisive policy of racism, which will also contribute to their defeat at the upcoming polls.
The AFC and PNC/APNU had previously coalesced for the 2015 and 2020 elections.
The AFC and APNU first joined forces in 2015 under the Cummingsburg Accord, revised in 2019 with fewer concessions for the AFC before expiring in December 2022. The coalition won the 2015 elections but lost power after a no-confidence motion in 2018.
Originally, the AFC held a 40 per cent stake in the coalition, which was reduced to 30 per cent in the 2019 revision. The party’s declining influence was reflected in its poor performance in the 2018 local Government elections and its perceived role in the no-confidence motion’s passage. Following their 2020 election loss, the APNU/AFC alliance officially ended in December 2022.
In January the two sides had set March 31 as the deadline for negotiations on a partnership for this year’s polls.
According to reports, the two sides had been embroiled in disagreements over the presidential candidate and power sharing arrangements within the potential partnership.
The AFC had published its conditions for a coalition, including the demand of a 40-60 split of Government positions in APNU’s favour, that its leader Nigel Hughes is the Presidential Candidate, and that the presidential candidate’s party should not hold the Leader of the List position, which controls parliamentary appointments and removal.
On the other hand, Leader of the APNU Aubrey Norton, had made it clear that the Peoples National Congress (PNC) – the largest faction in APNU – would not accept what he described as disrespect or external dictates given that the PNC carries “the burden of the work”.
“We ain’t going to let nobody take their eyes pass we. I want to make this commitment to you that this party will not allow anybody to ride on our backs. We are prepared to engage and be reasonable but we are not prepared to bend over backwards,” Norton had said.
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