APNU+AFC ‘divorce’ was a fallacy

− Ramjattan in full ‘lapdog’ mode – GS Jagdeo

General Secretary of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo is describing the ‘divorce’ between the Alliance for Change (AFC) and the A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) as a sham, cunning, gimmickry, and fake.

He was not convinced that the two political parties had cut political ties back in 2022 and Thursday said the press conference earlier in the week solidified his stance on the partnership.

The “Cummingsburg Accord” signed by the APNU and AFC on February 14, 2015, saw the parties uniting in a coalition that would see them winning the 2015 elections, but that seven-year partnership officially ended on December 31, 2022, as was announced by AFC Leader Khemraj Ramjattan.

“That so-called divorce that AFC and APNU spoke of in 2022…has been exposed as a fallacy,” Dr Jagdeo stated as he addressed the media.

Jagdeo said he long believed that the move was a gimmick because the AFC has lost its base.

“I dismissed it as a gimmick. The AFC had no base [and] had lost its base totally in its support because of the corrupt practices of the AFC members in government. And because of their excesses, not just in terms of financial matters, but in policy matters and also their arrogance in their interaction with people. They forgot their base totally, and therefore they lost it,” Dr Jagdeo stated.

This was compounded by the policy actions relating to the callous way they dealt with issues like the sugar industry and taxation among others.

Jagdeo said he could not be fooled or his attention could not be diverted from the writing on the wall. The AFC, he noted, never walked away or divorced the APNU but wanted Guyanese to be duped into thinking that it did because of some fake reason.

“I pointed out that it was just talk. Many people saw this as a sign that the AFC was intent on rebuilding and going back to the core ideals that it professed…that it had before 2015 which were democracy, being a good third force and a force for good and for accountability…That they were attempting to go back to that.

“Well, this press conference disabuses people’s minds that there was a divorce between these two organisations. They are all together and they will go to the elections together,” Dr Jagdeo said.

In criticizing the political choice of the two, Jagdeo described Ramjattan as a ‘lapdog’ who had been involved in ‘lapdog’ skills and politics.

“So, we saw Ramjattan in his usual mode, Ramjattan was in his full lapdog mode. He has honed this skill admirably, the lapdog skill. So, he was there, every time adding to Norton. I saw his comments. Norton made a statement, and he said ‘Before you take questions, I want to say my presence here is in full support of the statement made by the opposition leader’. He had to interject that.

“Then along the way, he said ‘Let me add that Aubrey is absolutely right about the issue’. That was his presence at the press conference. It was to support Aubrey Norton in the lapdog mode. Because AFC is nothing practically without the PNC”, he said. The general secretary predicted the AFC together with the APNU in the upcoming 2025 elections against his party, as they have done in every major general election since 2015.