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Sep 24, 2014 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon
President Donald Ramotar has written to David Granger offering consideration of issues of national importance. How Granger reacts and the shape of his acceptance will tell us about the nature of Granger’s politics.
Granger has no room to manoeuvre out of the invitation; he has to go and he should go. The only deterrence is the perception that Ramotar is into nonsense and it would be a waste of time talking to him. That is a plausible option, because after all, it is almost three years of the Ramotar presidency and he and his party have bulldozed Guyana without any recognition, however episodic, fleeting or situational, that the PPP is a minority regime.
But it is not what the PNC wants. It is what is politically required of the PNC. Accepting the invitation is necessary, in that it gives the PNC a chance to explain to Guyana and the world if Ramotar messes up. He could say that we went, talked, but these people are cruel, foolish and sick, and are not interested in saving Guyana.
Having accepted the invitation the PNC must form a delegation with the AFC. Should the PNC negotiate with Ramotar and his cabal and exclude the AFC, the PNC runs the risk of adding to the laceration of its credibility and image which characterized its recent congress. The Guyanese supporters of the two opposition parties want to see some concretized dialogue between the PNC and AFC. Mr. Granger cannot be that naïve to ignore the reality out there that the desire is for a PNC/AFC onslaught on the PPP.
In politics there is the ghost of realpolitik. For the lay people who constantly tell me to ease up on the unknown terms and big words I use, realpolitik simply means that if a policy or a strategy or a pathway will bring the politician political capital then irrespective of all other considerations, moral or otherwise, that direction will be chosen.
In going to Ramotar without AFC input, the PNC could say that it is in their interest in having all the political capital for itself should Ramotar capitulate. This is indeed realpolitik that will benefit the PNC. It means that the PNC can tell the world that it stood up to the PPP and got the PPP to democratize. The temptation is great, given the prize for the PNC to go to Ramotar on its own.
But failure can and will devastate the PNC. First, Granger will be seen as a poor negotiator. Critics will say he ditched the AFC, went to talk to Ramotar, and ended up with nothing. Surely that could hardly clean an already soiled face of the PNC.
Secondly, people will say that nothing but pure opportunism motivated the PNC into going it alone, and it was given the treatment it deserved by Ramotar.
Thirdly, Granger’s failure to get any substantial concession will enlarge the already expanding popularity of the AFC. Guyanese will say Ramotar was just playing with the PNC and the PNC was too silly to see it. Such chagrined folks may turn to the AFC. Fourthly, with a general election around the corner, the PNC must know by now that the AFC, in fielding its own list, will be competing for votes not only from the PPP but PNC too. Any massive foul-up by the PNC will cost it votes.
A political leader must at all times be possessed of the qualities of leadership. He/she may not have all the qualities, but at least must be endowed with some. One of the most important in the arsenal is “situational sensitivity.”
It is one of the leadership qualities in which the leader must be acutely aware of the particularities, sensitivities and uniqueness of a specific moment.
David Granger is pretty young in politics. In fact, when he inherited the top layer of the PNC he was the most inexperienced of his counterparts in all the major political parties in Guyana from the sixties onwards. The list includes the UF (not TUF), PNC, PPP, WPA, AFC, among others. In the few years that he had headed the PNC, Mr. Granger should have learned fast. Guyana is a deep and wide ocean of political turmoil in which once you swim in it, you are bound to understand the currents.
The waves should be understood by Granger the way Papillon did to escape from French Guiana to come to British Guiana and set up his cook shop in La Penitence. The short experience of David Granger was sufficient time for him to acquire “situational sensitivity.” He should be aware that the situation calls for a PNC/AFC face-off against the PPP tyranny.
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