AS Guyana approaches the September, 2025 general and regional elections, a stark political narrative is emerging that could fundamentally reshape the country’s electoral landscape.
While the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) grapples with a haemorrhage of experienced members and organisational chaos, the ruling People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) is persistently expanding its reach and consolidating support through calculated youth mobilisation and institutionalisation.

The PNCR’s decline has become more apparent through a series of high-profile exoduses that would have been unthinkable mere years ago.
Internal chaos within the party reached a crescendo during its most recent congress, where voting processes consumed over 10 hours beyond the scheduled time, registration mechanisms broke down and delegates complained bitterly about the party’s organisational ineptness.

More damaging than these recent logistical collapses, though, has been the steady trickle of experienced stalwarts deserting ship. James Bond, Daniel Seeram, Samuel Sandy and Geeta Chandan-Edmond have been just a few who have broken ranks with the party as part of a “steady trickle” of desertions that accelerated under Aubrey Norton’s leadership, reports say.

Most revealing is Norton’s tone-deaf reaction to the exodus. His assertion to be “not concerned at all” at losing senior members demonstrates a leadership perilously out of touch with political reality.
These defections appear to be more than numbers. They are the decimation of institutional memory, grassroots networks and political legitimacy at the worst possible time. When top party leaders openly identify themselves

with the PPP/C government, as a few have done, it delivers a life-threatening blow to opposition legitimacy that reverberates far beyond party headquarters.
Contrasting this, the PPP/C has had a bold expansionist policy that indicates sophisticated long-term political thinking.

One example of this is the Progressive Youth Organisation’s recruitment campaign, which brought unprecedented returns with over 900 new young members joining Regions One and Nine alone. General Secretary Bharrat Jagdeo’s ambitious target of building a “5,000-strong youth movement” was also not merely a matter of numbers, it was a strategic investment in the future leadership that will mature “in the next 10 years or so.”
This youth-mobilisation tactic takes the party beyond its traditional bastions into hinterland villages, forging new influence networks exactly where opposition parties have traditionally been weakest.
The PPP/C’s approach is one of a party that is self-assured on its path and deeply committed to institution-building.

While the PNCR lingers at low organisational capacity—i.e., controversy about membership rolls, the governing party methodically develops its organisational apparatus across the country.
This contrast captures virtually distinct institutional cultures: one of conflict-ridden intra-party struggle and erosion, the other of deliberate enlargement and change.
With September looming, these divergent trajectories foretell an election battle that can be more uneven than two-party tradition would expect.

The PNCR’s haemorrhage of experienced leadership and Norton’s apparent insensitivity to this crisis provide openings for the PPP/C to consolidate authority over previously contested seats, and record a landslide victory at the upcoming elections.