Dear Editor,

I SAW in the Stabroek News publication of August 24, 2016 the PPP picketing the High Court for that court to expedite the hearing of the elections petition. The party is claiming that the elections were fraudulent and rigged, and that they had won the elections.I can remember hearing Mr. Bharrat Jagdeo openly admitting that the PPP had lost the 2015 elections because the organisers did not do their ground work and some ministers of the Donald Ramotar minority government weren’t delivering the goods to the people, which caused the people to vote otherwise.

The PPP should accept that they had lost the elections in a fair race between themselves and the APNU+AFC coalition, because the PPP had taken for granted that no matter what they did to Indians, the Indians would vote for them; but they were dead wrong. People, especially the young voters, tend to move away from the party they had voted for if they were not treated fairly and with respect. This can happen to APNU+AFC coalition if they operate like the PPP.

Corruption was the key focus on the campaign trail by the coalition at every meeting and rally I had attended. This message had sent the crowd into a frenzy. The main target grouping at these meetings and rallies was young urban and rural people, many of whom were voting for the first time. With the voting age at 18, many of them had good memories of 23 years of corruption under the PPP, and they wanted a change, so they voted for the change.

All the coalition meetings and rallies were impressively attended by multi-ethnic crowds, thus the PPP lost those elections. There is no doubt in my mind that the elections were free and fair; and, like everything else, when a cricket team loses the match, they will cry foul that the umpire gave them bad decisions.

The PPP had pinned its hopes on a race and demographic strategy based on assumptions of a drop in the Afro votes, mainly due to the problems within the PNC arm in APNU, and crossover of AFC votes because of a coalition with APNU. It is also evident that going into the elections with Donald Ramotar as president for a second term was the PPP’s fatal mistake; he was all time unpopular within the rank and file of that party. To be honest, I like him, but he was never a suitable candidate or presidential material in the party.

The 2011 elections’ results had showed that Donald Ramotar barely scraped home with the winner takes all system.
Now having been defeated, the PPP seemingly has a fallback plan in discrediting the conduct and the results of the 2015 elections. Political analysts feel the PPP is trying to destroy the credibility of the results. Some hostile PPP media and television were key players in recklessly portraying that the elections were rigged and the PPP had won. Many people still actually believe the continued media lies planted mainly by anti-APNU+AFC propaganda manipulators that rigging had taken place, ballot boxes were missing, and calling for recount of some ballot boxes.

The release of reports from the Commonwealth, OAS and IFES international observer groups testifying to the fairness of the polls, and support messages from the US, UK and Canadian ambassadors and Western and other governments insisted that the elections were free and fair.

If the PPP wants to win another election in Guyana, that party’s personnel have to regroup and give the youths a chance; and it must be those who were not tainted with corruption and who can appeal to all cross-sections of the political divide. Using the race card is not the answer to win an election; people who were marginalised for the past 23 years do not forget easily.
Regards,
MOHAMED KHAN