I DON’T want Mr. Alston Stewart to sue me so in the discussion to follow I will not mention through which initiative he came to Guyana in 2015 to shape the strategy for the Alliance For Change (AFC). I know his name was recommended to Sheila Holder and Raphael Trotman and they acted on the advice given. I campaigned for the AFC in 2015 and never had a word with Mr. Stewart; not even a hi or hello.

I had no respect for Mr. Stewart in 2015 because as a long-standing activist in Guyana, I never heard about Mr. Stewart and thus had no knowledge of what he knew about Guyanese politics. For me, his role in the AFC in 2015 was unnecessary and I don’t believe his advice to the AFC made a difference. The APNU+AFC won the 2015 election by less than 4,500 votes and the PPP would have won a parliamentary majority if GECOM had ordered a recount in Region Eight which the PPP lost by one ballot.

In January of this year, Vice-President Jagdeo made some formidable accusations against Mr. Stewart’s company and I believe the Government of Guyana in 2021 filed a writ against Mr. Stewart’s company for an alleged failed business transaction involving the then Ministry of Public Infrastructure.

Mr. Stewart’s presence has returned to Guyana. He is once more a political strategist for the AFC under the new leadership of Nigel Hughes. Mr. Stewart would have failed in 2020 because the APNU+AFC ignominiously lost the general election in that year. So, what is Mr. Stewart doing in and with the AFC in 2025?

I have become disenchanted with Nigel, someone I once had some respect for his political thoughts. What is Nigel hoping to get from the thinking of Stewart? What can Stewart tell Nigel that dozens of other educated, experienced Guyanese who are Nigel’s friends cannot tell him?

Stewart does not live in Guyana. He can only bring to bear on the AFC’s 2025 election campaign, a general strategy on political mobilisation based on theoretical formulas. But at the end of the day, a strategist has to be deeply familiar with the unique sociological and historical factors that separate each country from others on Planet Earth.

What political parties around the world do is employ foreign strategists that map out the local territory and use computer models to shape political campaigns but, in the end, victory is not guaranteed because these foreigners are not combining theory with knowledge of the local terrain.

David Granger by himself or the PNC by itself brought down a group of white consultants for the 2020 election. The lead operative for this group met the AFC executive at State House and offered his blueprint for the campaign. He advised that the APNU+AFC methodology must emphasise Granger the man rather than Granger and Ramjattan as a team.

This white consultant was a stupid, ignorant man who knew nothing about West Indian politics. In 2020, the face of the Guyana Government was Joseph Harmon, the minister of the presidency and not David Granger. After five years in power, Granger proved that he was not a West Indian politician and he turned out to be the most distant, elitist party head and head of government, the West Indies ever produced.

Yet this white consultant advised the PNC and AFC they must forget about team Ganger/Ramjattan and concentrate on the personality of the man, Granger. It was logical that with such mumbo jumbo advice, the APNU+AFC would lose the 2020 election. To think that up to this day, no one from the AFC and PNC has accepted their obligation to their supporters to tell them who was this consultancy firm.

These are the very people that tell the nation day in, day out that the government is not accountable to the Guyanese public. So, we return to Alston Stewart. He came in 2015, the AFC barely won. He came in 2020, the AFC lost. What I would like to hear from the AFC leadership is what special skills he brings to the AFC for its 2025 campaign that it cannot find right here in Guyana.
In the current AFC leadership are people who were in parliament for five years and in power for five years. Are Nigel and his colleagues telling the nation that with all that experience, it is necessary to bring in Stewart once more? It is possible that Nigel and his executive believe that there is a special genius that Stewart possesses that the AFC needs. Or maybe the AFC executive is too ignorant and stupid to understand Guyanese politics.

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.