Rohee puts ‘campaign manager’ rumour to rest –‘We direct our show collectively,’ he says

AN announcement to name the Prime Ministerial candidate for the People’s Progressive Party/ Civic (PPP/C), and a date for the Party’s official campaign launch is yet to be made. 

But according to General Secretary, Mr Clement Rohee, that in no way affects the Party’s work on the ground, which continues to move apace.
Pressed yesterday at the Party’s weekly press conference at Freedom House into saying whether or not the PPP has indeed appointed a campaign manager ahead of the May 11 General and Regional elections as rumoured, his response was:
“The PPP does not have a history of identifying anyone as a campaign manager; the Party has not now, or in the past, done it. There is no one individual directing the show; we direct our show collectively; we have systems and mechanisms in place, and based on that, that is how we approach all elections.”
He also rubbished claims that Guyana’s current Honorary Consul to Trinidad and Tobago, Mr Ernie Ross, is the one that has been retained as campaign manager. “Ernie Ross was never a campaign manager for this Party,” Rohee said.
As to the rumour that the PPP has engaged a “campaign team” from the US, all he simply said was, “We don’t have a campaign team hired from the US working for the PPP.”
And while he did acknowledge that speculation has been rife as to who is supposedly holding the post of campaign manager, he maintained that the Party’s approach to its election campaign is as a collective.
He even tried to make light of it, saying, “This term, ‘campaign manager’ appears to be one that is being bandied around as if, ‘If you don’t have one, then you can’t make it.’”

EARLY ELECTIONS
The move to early elections resulted from the fact that the objectives of prorogation, in the face of a no-confidence motion against the Government and the consequent dissolution of Parliament, failed in the opinion of the current Administration.
Given the posture of the A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) and the Alliance For Change (AFC), President Ramotar has always maintained that the need for dialogue was uppermost in his mind when he made his decision to prorogue Parliament on November 10.
Paving the way for greater dialogue among political parties, he contended, would have kept the 10th Parliament alive to address critically important issues currently before the House.
The effect of ending the first session of the 10th Parliament by way of prorogation is the suspension of the business of the National Assembly. As a result of that move, the AFC-sponsored ‘No-Confidence’ Motion was not considered. Also, APNU had, prior to November 10, signalled its intention to support the Motion.
Since the prorogation, APNU and the AFC have made it clear that they will not engage the President in talks unless the prorogation is lifted, and Parliamentary work resumes. The rejection of talks was also formally communicated by APNU Leader, Brigadier (rtd) David Granger in a December 2 letter, responding to the President’s November 18 invitation for talks.
President Ramotar had made it clear that if dialogue did not fructify, there would be a move to early general elections.
As a result, the Head of State early last December indicated that Guyana will head to early General and Regional Elections, just over three years since the November 2011 polls.

(Vanessa Narine)

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