“Hi Jeff: has APNU `disappear’ the PNC?” Colourfully put, but not an uncommon query. Perhaps stated more cogently the question should have been: why has the PNC let itself be `disappeared’ by APNU?
Strange as it may appear to some, many voters still do not understand why it has been necessary for the PNC to lose its electoral identity within the entity called “A Partnership for National Unity.” Such persons tend to be traditional PNC supporters who, caught by a surprise enquiry of how will they vote, still find it difficult to spontaneously reply that they will vote APNU. Indeed, there is a school of thought that claims that by this blurring of its own existence, the PNC has, perhaps unwittingly, opened at least a miniscule opportunity for other parties to recruit within its constituency. I believe that this may be overstating the case, for both the PPP and the PNC have historically been very aware of the importance of their identity to their core constituencies. It is for this reason that we have the “C” in the PPP and the “Reform” and “One Guyana” in the PNC. But perhaps it is these failed PNC metamorphoses that have suggested to the new partnership that these kinds of combinations have run their course and have become stale if not dysfunctional.
The main reason coalitions are formed is to position their constituent parties to gain and/or influence government and this depends in no small measure, inter alia, on the composition and structure of the voting population and the constitutional requirement for political participation. Take the latter: if, for example, a constitution sets a threshold of say 3% of votes before one can win a seat in the national assembly, it will make sense for small parties who cannot independently reach this threshold to form an alliance.
Although the PPP/C and the various PNC configurations are/were pre-election alliances of sorts, it is the People’s National Congress/United Force alliance of the 1960s that springs to mind when alliance politics are being discussed in Guyana, and this is largely because of how the others were constructed from established political parties. Regardless of their size, APNU has essentially been created by existing parties and therefore is in that category that is more globally accepted as a pre-election alliance. Although post-election associations have been more prevalent, such pre-election formations are not unusual. For example, in 2006, it was calculated that pre-electoral alliances constituted 20.42% of the 364 elections that were held in 23 countries in Western Europe and made up 28% of the 54 elections in 11 countries of Central Europe. (P Marek & G Bingham-Powell Jr -2011- “Pre-election Coalition and Party System Development: Central European Variations” American Political Science Association).
All pre-election coalitions are not structured in the manner that APNU’s is. Parties may only agree to a nomination agreement and jointly support candidates in given regions or districts. In places where the voter has more than one choice, parties may request that their constituency support some specific party as their second choice. They may also agree to put up a joint list, much as ANPU is now attempting to do. It is claimed that these kind of open pre-election alliances are more transparent than post-election arrangements that give the party leadership involved in the post-election bargaining process much more say over the nature and content of the new government. Be that as it may, all modern alliances require some kind of alliance agreement, which normally would indicate the major programmatic platform and how the spoils of office are to be allocated. APNU has published an agreement that indicates its programmatic outlook although it has so far only indicated who its presidential candidate will be.
The single list alliance that I believe comes closest to what is being attempted by APNU is the Barisan National of Malaysia. The Barisan is a 1973 outcrop of the Malaysian Alliance Party which was formed in 1951, fought the British for independence and is credited with significantly easing the ethnic tension that arose in the 1950s between the Chinese, Indians and ethnic Malay, thus allowing sufficient space for Malaysian development. It is an alliance of about a dozen more or less communal political parties but the vast majority of its seats are held by the United Malays National Organisation, the Malaysian Chinese Association and the Malaysian Indian Congress.
Save for election purposes, the organisational integrity of the various parties are maintained and although now abolished, at one point individuals were allowed direct membership to the alliance. The Barisan usually refers to itself as a confederation of political parties and over the years, some alliance machinery, such as an alliance council to coordinate efforts and deal with internal conflicts, has been established. Political parties compete among themselves even in their various ethnic communities and although individual parties may publish their own manifestos there is a general alliance manifesto and all the parties go to elections under the Barisan emblem.
As I see it, APNU became necessary largely because of our racial configuration, voting patterns and constitutional requirements. Our racial/ethnic context is sufficiently known and understood to not detain us. However, our constitution insists that the presidential candidate of the party list that wins the highest plurality of votes at a general election will gain the presidency but that the party must also receive more than 50% of the votes cast if it is to have control of the national assembly. In this context, regardless of the magnitude of a post-electoral alliance, it cannot win the presidency although it might control the national assembly. Of course, it does not take much to see that it was far from sensible for a country with two dominant ethnic groups as numerically differentiated as ours and with the kind of voting traditions we have, to have constitutionalised a rule that gives the presidency to the largest multiple. A more acceptable arrangement would have been to require the individual wanting to be president to at least gain more than 50% of the votes.
That said, since the parties of APNU (rooted as it is in the largely African-supported PNC) seek sufficient votes to win the presidency, some form of pre-election alliance was necessary. As we have seen, its approach is neither unique nor very complex. It is merely a confederation of political parties that view the present constitutional arrangements as untenable and recognise the necessity of an alliance if its constituent parties are to win sufficient influence at the next election to be in a position to make the radical inclusive constitutional changes this country requires. In this sense, for the coming elections, APNU may have “disappeared” the PNC but it is a necessary historical development.
henryjeffrey@yahoo.com
