— APNU general secretary says coalition to contest upcoming elections as one

THE A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) and the Alliance For Change (AFC) are currently discussing the pending revision of the Cummingsburg Accord – the February 14 agreement that brought them together ahead of the 2015 General and Regional Elections.
APNU General Secretary, Joseph Harmon, in a recent interview with Guyana Chronicle, confirmed that the Cummingsburg Accord will be revised ahead of the next General and Regional Elections. He said the APNU and AFC have been meeting, and the revision is the subject of active discussion.

“We are looking at the revision right now,” Harmon told this newspaper, while further disclosing that parties have agreed to principles that would guide them going forward.

“The important thing, however, is that we have agreed on some basic principles which will guide the relationship between the APNU and the AFC. Those statements of principles are agreed to and therefore it is clear that in the next elections we are going forward as APNU and AFC, a coalition,” the APNU General Secretary said.

According to him, ahead of the elections, the coalition will issue a statement on the Cummingsburg Accord, which will detail how they will proceed. However, he iterated that the APNU and AFC will remain a united force.

The Cummingsburg Accord will expire on February 14, 2020, however, with General and Regional Elections expected this year, the early revision of the accord becomes necessary.
Working People’s Alliance, a party that forms part of the five member partnership, APNU, has long underscored the importance of not only revising the Cummingsburg Accord but also the APNU Charter.

In a separate interview with Guyana Chronicle, WPA Executive Member, Dr. David Hinds, said revision of both the charter and accord is necessary.

“If you do that, you are giving your people the confidence that you are sorting out your problems,” Dr. Hinds told this newspaper.

According to him, the political parties have not done a good job at managing the coalition. However, he agreed that managing a coalition is no easy task. “Managing coalitions are not easy and in a place like Guyana, you look at a party like the WPA and the PNC polls apart, enemies of the past….The AFC, came into being, vowing, never to join with the PNC. And what you have are parties with different ideological positions, so managing is important,” Dr. Hinds explained.

He said the larger parties should not engage in over-shadowing and over- powering the smaller partners, reminding that it is a partnership, and a coalition. The WPA executive underscored the importance of constant communication and meeting.

“I mean, the coalition should be meeting outside of Parliament, should be meeting every two, three months. APNU should be meeting every month, so you have different polls of decision-making and you are knowing what your partners are thinking,” he reasoned.
Dr. Hinds is of the opinion that had the coalition partners met constantly outside of the National Assembly and Cabinet, “Charrandass Persaud would have been detected”.

Last December, Persaud, while sitting in the National Assembly as an APNU+AFC Member of Parliament, voted with the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) to bring down his own government. Outside the Parliament, he told reporters his views were not taken on board and he was displeased with certain decisions of the government. He was subsequently recalled. However, it is the belief of Dr. Hinds that Persaud’s betrayal could have been detected or prevented.

“I think if we had that in place, we would have detected Charrandass, perhaps Charrandass would not have been unhappy. But even if he was unhappy, we would have detected him and so forth. I think we should learn from that moment and manage the coalition much better because our people out there, they voted for a coalition, they didn’t vote for a single party. There are people who will never vote for WPA, there will be people who would never vote for PNC, there are people who would never vote for the AFC, so they vote for this totality, qualitatively better government but we have got to make it work,” Dr. Hinds reasoned.

The WPA executive emphasised that the coalition must work. “The beauty about the coalition, it is a diversity of ideas, a diversity of strengths, and a diversity of weaknesses, but you equal out when you engage the coalition, not as big parties, but when you sit around that table is not about big versus small, when you sit around the table it is about consensus,” he said.

It was the coming together of the APNU and AFC that aided the defeat of the PPP/C Government. The coalition garnered 206,817 votes in the general election and 201,324 in the Regional elections. They were granted 33 seats in the National Assembly as against the 32 won by the PPP/C.