LET us see if we can do this thing clearly step by step with explanatory comments and at the end of it see what meaning can emerge if any (S is for step. C is for comment).

S1 – The AFC is saying that it cannot accept the leader of the PNC, Aubrey Norton, as the presidential candidate if the AFC unites with the PNC for the 2025 election because as the candidate Norton would not attract votes for the coalition to win.
C1 – The AFC has never seen the decency and the obligation to inform the Guyanese people why it objects to Norton. This is unheard of in any other country. And here is where Guyana’s journalistic climate is porous. In any other country, once Party B proclaims that it would like to team up with Party A for the upcoming general elections but it has a problem with the leader of Party A, the media would be like bees swarming over the officials of Party B asking why is the leader of Party A untenable to them.

The AFC holds a weekly press conference and not one journalist has asked the question that is compulsory to ask. It is such an important question that it must be put to the press conference. It goes like this: “Mr. Hughes since you have publicly indicated that the AFC will not accept Mr. Norton being the consensus candidate, could you explain why the AFC finds him ineligible?

How can any journalist fail to put this question to the AFC’s press meetings? Today is Thursday and tomorrow the AFC will hold yet another Friday briefing. Is it too much to inquire of the AFC’s leadership why Norton cannot be accepted as the presidential candidate for a PNC/AFC coalition slate for 2025?

S2- The AFC asserts that it is willing to go into the election without Mr. Hughes being the consensus candidate if the others out there that fit the bill accept the position. But the AFC has not named any other person than Terrence Campbell. Assuming the AFC does not want to rattle off names that it has not consulted, why can it not explain to the nation why Campbell is eligible?

C2- Terrence Campbell has no political experience. The only stint in politics that Campbell has was in 2020, when he threw his hat in the election ring and within days withdrew from the process. That was four and a half years ago. Since then, Campbell has not immersed himself in political activism. Why the AFC sees such a person as a vote catcher?
S3- I have covered this ground before and I am repeating it here so our journalists can ask Mr. Aubrey Norton for his explanation. The PNC has accepted an election arrangement with the AFC and has offered the AFC the prime ministerial slot. The AFC has rejected this formula.

C3 – If the PNC can win the 2025 poll on its own, as stated by Mr. Norton, why is it sacrificing the second most important powerful position in the governmental machinery to the AFC? Please see my column of Monday, March 31 titled, “Political Questions that must be answered.”

S4- The AFC wants 40 percent share of power if the APNU+AFC wins in 2025. The PNC cannot accept this because it says it has to give some power to the small constituents in APNU and this reduces the PNC’s percentage of 60. So there is no PNC or PNC-R contesting the 2025 election, it will be APNU.

C4- Is the PNC telling Guyana that literal, virtual, one-person parties are going to get ministries if APNU wins the government? That announcement has been made, so APNU can now expect a deluge of constituents because one-man bands are going to be born within a few months’ time and they are going to apply for APNU membership.

I met this young man in the National Park two months ago. He was no derelict. He dressed well, spoke well. He asked for my advice because he said he wants to form a political party. I met him last week, and he said he is proceeding. Think of how many like him you will have by September.

How can APNU refuse their applications when APNU has four one-person outfits in its midst? This is the most caricatured form of politics the world has ever seen. So if ten parties are included in APNU, and AFC agrees to accept 30 percent rather than forty, then the PNC will be reduced to far less than 70 percent of power because if it wins, it has to give 10 paper organisations each a ministry. This is comedy non-stop.

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.