…leaders complain about lack of time, candidates as Nomination Day nears

WHILE some small parties contesting the 2020 Elections have expressed confidence in completing their List of Candidates ahead of Nomination Day, others are scurrying for almost any form of coalition to remain relevant.

Presidential candidate of the Guyana National Service Party (GNS), Oral Semple, told the newspaper on Tuesday that that the GNS was almost at the mark. “We’re already set for Nomination Day,” he said noting that the party is contesting all 10 Regions and had all its candidates save for some trouble in Region One. Semple said that several parties had approached for a coalition due their lack of sufficient nominees and these included Change Guyana and the Kingdom Liberal Movement (KLM). Change Guyana is led by businessman, Robert Badal, and Chartered Accountant, Nigel Hinds, while the KLM is a religious-based party led by Presidential Candidate, Bishop Linden Hercules. Back in November, Badal stated that his party was contesting in all 10 Administrative Regions and was confident that it would “find names for all the Regions”.

When Semple spoke with the newspaper, he said that he had been receiving calls throughout the day from the KLM and was moments from joining them at a location for a meeting. However, Semple said that he was leaning more on the side of Change Guyana as KLM, like the People’s Republic Party (PRP) – another religious party – is not truly best for Guyana. “The demand that his Christian party is making, it doesn’t sound too healthy for Guyana. It doesn’t sound healthy. Their concept is not of politics, they are trying to push this one religious system and Guyana is not ready for a religious government because it’s going to be war,” he said.

Semple stated his belief that many of the parties, which are contesting the elections, are unlikely to amass the necessary candidates so he is not surprised that persons have begun to contact him. When it comes to Change Guyana, he stated: “[Badal] was trying to get on to us also because everybody knows about the Guyana National Service…I had already thought it in my mind to collate with him because he seems to be balanced.”

However, he admitted that there would be other snags as the GNS is not readily prepared to give up its presidential candidate spot for a party which may receive fewer votes than they do. Speaking with presidential candidate of the United Republic Party (URP), Dr.Vishnu Bandhu, he said the party’s list was 80 per cent completed and that he had turned down coalition requests from the likes of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C). “The URP is not merging with no political party,” he said. “Other political parties have called and asked us to come together and we said no. PPP called me but I never went. Bharrat [Jagdeo] had called me personally, I never went. Badal’s party had called me…but we are going alone, we’re not merging with nobody.”

While in past elections the party has not been able to accumulate enough votes for a seat in parliament, Dr. Bandhu said that in 2020 URP is confident that it will win “a few seats”.
Meanwhile, the Democratic National Congress (DNC), over a year later, seemed to still be living up to its label as a “one man party”. DNC presidential candidate, Craig Sylvester, grew famous for the wrong reason in 2018 when he launched his party at the National Library and one news reporter attended. On Tuesday, Sylvester told the newspaper that – although it registered with GECOM – the party had no candidates and was hoping that some form of a coalition would fix the problem.

“We are open to merges but so far we haven’t actually had any persons coming forward to join our slate but we expect it to change very soon because Guyana cannot go forward, parties cannot win just like that,” he said, noting that he hadn’t directly reached out to any party and would within the next few days. Asked whether the party had gained a following since its 2018 launched, Sylvester answered indirectly. “Guyanese people are still looking at me and laughing at me as the one man party; you know I’m famous for that. But we cannot continue laughing because we are in a jam right now and our future is at stake…I expect a lot of support, it’s just that we are waiting on people to come on board,” he said.
The DNC leader is also unprepared to give up the presidential post to another party in the case of a merger unless that leader proves to be better than him.

He said: “I do not see any other person, whether it be of ANUG or LJP, I do not see any of these individuals offering better leadership than me as presidential candidate and I do not think that they can draw wide support…unless someone is more significant than I am, who I think can actually make a dent in the voters population.” Just one week ago, the Guyana Chronicle was the sole attendee to the launching to the ‘Destiny to Oneness’ party which is also contesting the elections.

TCI OPTIMISTIC
For their part, The Citizenship Initiative (TCI) representative, Ruel Johnson, presented a more optimistic position that the party was about 75 per cent complete. This, he said, was not due to a lack of interest but to the TCI’s careful selection process which takes care to include a large percentage of women and youths. However, he noted that it has been challenging to secure candidates in the interior regions even as he pointed out the period between Nomination Day and Elections Day is shorter this year compared to others. Other challenges he pointed out were that the party heard that people in the public service were being told not to sign up as candidates and during the GECOM field verification process representatives of a “major party” pretended to be GECOM staff to get persons to fill out their nomination lists.

Johnson said that while TCI has been approached by a number of parties, it still is looking to contest the polls alone. Recently, two parties contesting the elections, A New and United Guyana (ANUG) and Federal United Party (Fed-Up), faced with limited support, teamed up with hopes of making a bigger difference. Other parties the Guyana Chronicle reached out to without success was the New Movement (TNM), while parties such as the Organisation For the Victory of the People, Horizon and Star, National Congress of Progressive Peoples Alliance, the Cooperative Republicans of Guyana and the Guyana United Democratic Party (UDP), hadn’t any readily available contact information online.

“There are parties that arise out of the political and social situation in the country, and then there are parties that are formed around elections time, and I think a lot of the newer parties that you’re seeing now are parties that are formed around the election time, which means that they are formed just to contest the elections,” Working People’s Alliance (WPA) Executive Member, Dr. David Hinds, said in an invited comment back in October 2019.
The sentiment has been shared that serious political parties should not be waiting until an election period to emerge, and must have more going for them than simply being a “pressure group”. Nonetheless, Nomination Day is still on track for January 10, 2020 and the venue has been confirmed for the Umana Yana.