NO political analyst is worth his/her degree if they conclude that the AFC won nine seats in the 2020 elections. From 2015, there has been no concrete evidence of what kind of support the AFC has. In 2015, the APNU+AFC won the national election by less than 5000 votes. Out of the 218, 000 votes APNU+AFC got, there is no scientific evidence available to tell the researcher what was the individual tally of the AFC.
I believe had the AFC stood on its own in 2020, it may not have received one parliamentary seat. The PNC in 2020 gifted the AFC 9 parliamentary seats. As a third party, the AFC came and went. It literally self-destructed between 2015 and 2020. For all intents and purposes the AFC and the WPA are dead fishes in the water, kept alive by the Kaieteur News and the Stabroek News.

We are months into a new contest and the AFC has become the most barefaced organisation on the political landscape in Guyana. Two manifestations of this delusion of grandeur are on display. One is that it wants to coalesce with the PNC. The other is that it entertains the possibility that its leader can be the consensus candidate.

What is going on here is incredible. A party that may not win one seat in 2025 wants to have a coalition with another party that is assured of at least 15 seats (the PNC). Why then should the PNC have a partnership with the AFC and, as part of the covenant, have to allot seats to the AFC when the country believes the AFC will not get even three seats?

To add insult to injury, the AFC put forward the suggestion that its head can be a consensus candidate. Here is where the researcher gets confused. If Norton is not electable, why is Nigel Hughes electable? They both have enormous disadvantages of different kinds, of course.
Norton is not eligible for a large PNC cache of votes. He will lose votes badly if he is the presidential candidate, but who says Hughes can win more ballots as a consensus candidate? Hughes has different baggage from Norton. One is that his route to the AFC leadership was not an admirable one. His entry was a sudden one which caused both Aubrey Norton and Sherrod Duncan to exclaim that you just can’t suddenly appear like that and want to be a leader.
Secondly, much to my disappointment because I thought Hughes was a keen reader of politics, is the fact that Hughes is leading the AFC with has-been men and women of yesterday looking for the dreams that they burnt up themselves on the altar of political betrayal. What is going through the mind of Hughes?

Here is what Hughes is thinking. He says forget that I am leading a ragged army of spent mavericks; I will get votes because the Mulatto/Creole class (MCC) that I come from will not vote for Norton. This columnist knows this is true. When Norton became head of the PNC, I did a series on him and one article in the series argued that the MCC will not accept him. Corbin is anathema to the MCC and Hughes knows this.

Hughes then is gambling on the fact that he will get votes from the MCC denting Norton’s share of the national ballots so he tells Norton why don’t you let me be the consensus candidate because I can bring in ballots from the MCC plus ordinary African Guyanese who see your leadership as hopeless.
This is a gamble by Hughes, but I don’t think Norton is playing the game. Norton is prepared to lose votes, but he knows by giving Hughes the presidential candidacy, the PNC will have to share parliamentary seats with the AFC over and above what the AFC will realistically get. In this respect, Norton is deadly accurate.

The best thing for Nigel Hughes to do is to face the electorate by himself as CN Sharma, Mark Benschop, Robert Badal, Lenox Shuman and Ralph Ramkarran did. We know how those men did in election contests; the country should know how Nigel with fare. The PNC should make it clear to the AFC that if there is a partnership with the AFC, the AFC can only get two seats and also not the presidential candidacy.

If the AFC says it cannot sign on to that arrangement, then Norton should outright reject any alliance. The time has come for the AFC to contest the 2025 election by itself and the results will show if it will end up in La Repentir or on top of Mount Roraima, looking down at its victory. Don’t do it Aubrey! Let the AFC go its own way!
DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.