Dear Editor,
Leader of the People’s National Congress (PNC) Aubrey Norton has only himself to blame for the dismal showing by the party on Nomination Day.
Nomination Day exacerbated the PNC’s leadership crisis, at the very least the optics of it, since many prominent faces within the party’s leadership, particularly Members of Parliament (MP) were absent from the frontlines.
I scoured online at the party’s Facebook page and other media entities to find photographs of the PNC contingent on Nomination Day.
What I found was the absence of the party’s MPs which is appalling, but not surprising given the leadership crisis that has developed within the party since losing the 2020 regional and general elections.
However, one would have thought that in the interest of presenting a united front publicly and shoring up the base, the MPs would have appeared alongside Norton to lend support to the many candidates, especially those contesting elections for the first time under the PNC’s palm tree symbol.
Behold, it was not to be. Perhaps, the relationship between Norton and MPs is worse than we are being led to believe. Several days later we have not heard any good reason for the MPs staying away from the Nomination Day activities. Therefore, one is left to draw their own conclusion.
My own analysis of the PNC’s Nomination Day fiasco is that the MPs boycotted Norton’s leadership, sending the clearest possible message ahead of Congress that they are ready to end the Aubrey Norton experiment.
Since regaining power in 2020, the PPP/C has demonstrated empathy, provided a united leadership front and clear messaging and direction on national issues.
Hence, the PPP/C appears to be marching towards another enormous victory at the Local Government Elections.
In contrast, Norton has communicated mixed messages to supporters. At one stage, he stated that the PPP/C will not call LGE because the party’s ideology was at odds with local democracy which is a falsehood.
Then, Norton said that the PNC was not going to contest LGE because the list was flawed. This view in itself was also flawed.
Norton further confused his supporters by stating his approval of the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) national day of resistance on June 12, the day for LGE polls.
At no point in the past several months did Norton send a clear and unambiguous message of contesting LGE. The few meetings in traditional strongholds like North Ruimveldt could not galvanize the base.
It is often said in political spheres that leadership matters…that empathy is a common trait often ignored by politicians who prefer to trade on ideologies.
Norton’s leadership lacks empathy while the ideology of race-baiting is outdated which creates a further disconnect with Guyanese at the grassroot level.
His MPs by their own actions on Nomination Day appear to agree with me.
Yours truly,
Brian Azore
