NOW that he has been legally scratched from the presidential race and is facing an avalanche of fresh interest for his replacement, the Opposition Leader was quick to blame “Nagamootoo’s ego”; “Nagamootoo’s ambition”; “Nagamootoo’s opportunism” for the political mudslide in which he finds himself.

While cunningly protecting his own pawns, he has started to taint would-be challengers with imagined character blemishes of the one man who has unmasked his phony political profile. As the failed king-maker, he had manipulated inner-party processes to preserve not only power, but his perks, privileges and pension; for him, the quintessential symbols of the pseudo-PPP that he now heads.

PROCESS SUBVERTED
The Opposition Leader has had his say; it is now My Turn to give context for his irrational outbursts.
When he subverted the process ahead of the 2011 elections by effectively hand-picking a presidential candidate, he and his cabal were too bombastic and arrogant to see the inevitable consequence of my resignation and subsequent strategic political re-alignment.

In 2011, after almost two decades of unbroken power, the PPP lost its parliamentary majority. The incumbent lame-duck regime could not survive for a full term, and surrendered political office in 2015.

The “Nagamootoo Nightmare” has come back to haunt him, so the Robb Street “Bossman” (That’s all he is now!) is promising a “fair” political process in the selection of the presidential candidate for the next national elections. It is not going to happen. For me, it’s déjà vu of the faked procedures and the rigged processes by which an iron-clad majority of sycophants would, again, rubber-stamp the diktat of the self-styled leader.

This time around, I was assured, it would not be a walk-over; “Bossman” would be met with a stiff “F” campaign: “Fight For Frank” (Dr. Frank Anthony). Ahead of this campaign, anticipatory moves are afoot to dislodge the “Jaganite” Komal Chand from the leadership of GAWU, (sugar workers) which, together with RPA (rice farmers) have an historical, built-in appeal at the ethnic and traditional support base of the party.

I will shortly provide a graphic example of the potency of this power-base.

ONLY GUARANTEE
The only guarantee of a “fair” process would be a Congress at which delegates vote openly for the presidential candidate, and, preceding that, all contenders are allowed equal opportunities to address regional conferences.

This is unlikely to happen. Unless there is a single candidate, the Party Congress is the supreme authority, not the Executive (ExCo) or Central Committee (CC), to decide who runs for the presidency.

In 1990, though Dr. Cheddi Jagan was unopposed, Congress had to decide on accepting a non-party person, Samuel Hinds, as the Prime Ministerial candidate, and as a potential successor in the event that the president was unable to perform the functions of presidential office. That Congress also allocated a fixed percentage of parliamentary seats to the “Civic”.

For the 1997 elections, when Mrs. Janet Jagan had appeared hesitant, there was almost a contest when I nominated Dr. Roger Luncheon as Presidential Candidate, and Mr. Ralph Ramkarran for the Prime Ministerial slot. Consideration of my primary nominee by the Central Committee was quickly aborted when the then head of the Rice Producers Association blurted out, “Abee na ready yet fu wan blackman”; and another leader added that he could not sell that candidate to sugar workers.

Dr. Luncheon silently understood the message from the ethnic power-base. He unemotionally stepped aside, and nominated Mrs Jagan. She became the single candidate.

REFERENDUM ON SUCCESSOR
What she dramatically did after her indorsement by the Central Committee was to name a successor, which only the “matriarch” could be allowed to do without recourse to either the Constitution of Guyana or the precedent of the 1990 Congress.

However, in 1998, much to her dislike, the PPP Congress used the election of a new Central Committee as a referendum on the successor issue, which was not taken to the membership for ratification. The official results showed that I received the second highest number of votes (unofficially the highest), only after then President Janet Jagan. Those results showed that Congress wanted a say on the successor issue, and the members had spoken. It was an overwhelming rejection of her unilateral choice of Bharrat Jagdeo to replace her!

Then came the back-lash a week later. At the first meeting of the Central Committee, I was not re-elected to the 15-member Central Committee; the first time in 20 years! I was co-opted to this body after I was stopped from walking out and possibly resigning from the PPP.

The emasculation of Congress by the dominant, Moscow-trained Stalinist gang was to be repeated ten years later, in 2008. While the “Gang” was still obsessed with my “ambition”, they went to sleep when Dr. Frank Anthony, like a fresh lamb, entered the powerhouse. Then, the authentic youth leader, Dr. Frank Anthony, scored the third highest number of popular votes. I came in fifth. Yet, when the Central Committee met, it ruthlessly devoured him. Both Frank and I, at the Top Five of popular support, were excluded from the Executive Committee!

GANG OF EIGHT
Domination of the Executive Committee (inner Cabinet) was key to the control of the political processes and preservation of the axis of power by what Dr. Joey Jagan would identify as “the Gang of Eight”. In the selection of a presidential candidate, the ExCo arrogated to itself the role of “recommending” a slate of candidates, which I stoutly rejected, for the 2011 elections.

For those elections, for the first time there were multiple candidates: Ralph Ramkarran, Clement Rohee, Gail Teixiera, Donald Ramotar and myself. I adamantly demanded an open, democratic and transparent process, and suggested the preliminary selection of the suitable candidate at ten regional conferences, and final approval at a Special Congress.

During the critical stages of the debate on what form the selection should take, President Jagdeo removed the Central Committee meeting to State House, the president’s official residence. Some of his ministers insisted that the Executive Committee should make a recommendation of a suitable candidate, and for the Central Committee to make the final decision.

CLUMSY COMEDY
The Gang of Eight was pressured to provide evidence to show that Congress had delegated its authority to the Central Committee, but what followed was a clumsy comedy. The Recording Secretary later said that such an authority existed, but the Minutes Book had been destroyed when the Ministry of Health building was gutted by fire! So, I withdrew myself from that rigged process and, after 50 years of devotion to my Leader and sacrifices for my Party, I resigned from the PPP. I reinvested my trust in my people. The rest is now history.

The “Gang of Eight” has become bold and entrenched. With the departure after me of the best known revolutionary intellectual, Ralph Ramkarran, and the subsequent death of the uncompromising, foremost “Jaganite”, Navin Chanderpaul, the leadership was stacked with a new coterie of flatterers and hero worshippers.
Taking the selection process for a party presidential candidate to the PPP Central Committee is, in my opinion and from experience, like putting a cat to watch milk!