Dear Editor,
IN launching the newly founded AFC in 2005, their first leader, Raphael Trotman, boldly proclaimed “[i]t is time for change! Our change is the key to unlocking Guyana’s future. It is time for the Alliance For Change!”

Despite some early success at the 2006 and 2011 elections, the AFC began a slow and ignominious journey of disrepute. Based on its record since its founding, the three base qualities of the AFC appear to be a penchant for irresponsible conduct, betrayal, and conspicuous indecisiveness.

No one less than Raphael Trotman, one of the party’s founders was forced to admit at the launching of the AFC that people see them as “wishy washy rejects, upstarts, … and opportunists” (Trotman’s inaugural speech of the AFC).

The party’s performance in parliament between 2011 and 2015 was nothing short of an abandonment of responsibility. We must never forget, for instance, that it was the AFC that dug its heels in to cut $3.8 billion from the budget in 2012 (Stabroek News 19/4/2012), and it took a separate deal to get past the AFC war against the working class.
The AFC cuts were defeated, and the party was shamed. Former president, Donald Ramotar, told this writer that the AFC was monumentally “obstructionist” and “anti-developmentalist” during the period under consideration.

The worst was yet to come because bit by bit, the AFC inched its way into the seductive arms of the PNC/APNU. The Cummingsburg Accord of 2015 joined the AFC and the APNU at the hips. By so doing, the AFC did what it had always promised its supporters and the Guyanese people not to ever do, namely, help the PNC(R) back to state power. In short order, scorn was heaped on the AFC.

Haseef Yusuf, AFC Councillor -Region Six was frank and direct about how he and other Berbicians saw the coalition.
“I have written volumes about the lies and deceit [of the AFC], but for the first time, many Berbicians who have supported the AFC in the past, have come out openly and condemned the coalition between the AFC and APNU, and are crying betrayal. Sugar workers are so angry that they have become paranoid” (Guyana Chronicle, 16/2/2015).

By 2016, the AFC was taking licks from inside its ranks. David Hinds jabbed it with “…if the AFC thinks it has given me freedom, I hereby tell the AFC— “Teck back yuh Freedom” (Demerara Waves, May 2, 2016). And by 2018, no less than Henry Jeffrey accused “…the party (AFC) of betraying the agenda of the people who had supported it” (Stabroek News, 16/8/2018)
With the elections of March 2020, the real AFC was exposed.

This time, the AFC did not only betray its supporters, but it also betrayed the Constitution of Guyana by its attempt to rig the elections. The APNU+AFC and their leaders, including Mr. Moses Nagamootoo and Mr. Khemraj Ramjattan, reportedly did everything possible to prove correct how people saw the AFC in 2005, namely, as “wishy washy rejects, upstarts…, and opportunists.” Even if it was the APNU that was the chief rigger, the AFC lacked the courage to stand up for what is right. Leaked video proved that Ramjattan knew the PPP/C had won.

The indecisiveness of the AFC has surfaced yet again. This time, in a mass of confusion, the AFC has left the coalition, but does not have the strength to say it was abused, or that it is gone for good. Rather, it has left the door to go back in for more abuse. Any party worth its salt would have taken a bold step and walked away with some dignity. The “wishy-washy” label once acknowledged by the AFC, is now in full view.

Asked if the AFC would go back to the APNU, Ramjattan’s answer was not only shocking but saturated with indecisiveness. He said he would go back to the APNU, and this after all the skullduggery with election theft. But then, out of nowhere he also said he is open to the PPP, while in the same breadth continues to falsely accuse the PPP of corruption.
No one would doubt at this point that the ‘apetura’ to the PPP is simply to regain support from Berbicians. How astoundingly cynical? The people of Berbice, like the people across this land, are good judges of character. I have every confidence they do not believe a word Mr. Ramjattan says anymore.

They have heard enough and seen, enough. The AFC is now trying to turn a new page and fashion a new political identity. Having divorced the APNU, it is likely to seek sympathy. It will receive none. Guyanese people are people with long memories and will hold the AFC accountable for its betrayal.

In the inaugural speech launching the party, the AFC promised the world to the Guyanese people. “Today’s ceremony is not the launching of a political party but the birth of a movement of consciousness. A consciousness that says that we the people have had enough and want what is our sacred due: Respect, equality, prosperity, and security. It is time!” Psalms 118, Martin Carter, Robert Frost and Buju Banton were invoked.

Surely, they will retain the support of friends and family, but the party’s days are done. Now the people will invoke Psalm 34:13. What began as a tragedy, has now turned into farce.

Yours sincerely,
Dr. Randolph Persaud