Dear Editor,
I read with great amusement Dr Henry Jeffrey‘s Future Notes column captioned: `The WPA: the self-proclaimed apologist for the PNCR!’ (SN Oct 16). If the learned doctor/politician had contended that the WPA was a self-proclaimed apologist for the APNU+AFC government I would have agreed with him 100%. However, since he reduces the coalition to the PNCR I am forced to question his objectivity and intent.
Jeffrey has been among the detractors of the WPA since the coalition government came to office. He has dismissed the party as having no electoral or political relevance and then declared the WPA dead. At the same time, he and others are paying keen attention to what we say and do in this critical election period. The obvious question that comes to mind is: why waste time with a party that is dead and politically irrelevant? Given his contention, it would be better for him to use his time to promote the ANUG and seek to consolidate his apparent diminishing influence in that party of which he is a founder member. Why not ignore the WPA and allow the “dead” to rest in peace?
No, he like many of our detractors can’t do as I asked. Why? There must be something that is responsible for this contradiction. Jeffrey owes the nation an explanation. However, I am doubtful that given his present political dilemma in the ANUG and the national level he doesn’t have what it takes to do as I am requesting.
Jeffrey and our detractors vehemently call on the WPA to accept responsibility for missteps and perceived shortcomings of the APNU+AFC coalition government. They do so pointing to the convention of “collective responsibility”. To which we agree. However, when the WPA invoked the “right of collective defence” they accuse us of all sort of transgressions. They want the WPA to be accountable for the actions of the government but not defend the government of which we are part.
On this issue of political accountability, I find it difficult to ignore Henry Jeffrey’s opportunism since he has been an ally of the PPP/C and held a senior ministerial position for a number of years. Through-out that period, he was notably silent on the machinations of the regime and apparently, was devoid of the knowledge of the “dominant ethnic paradigm”. Like Colum-bus, he rediscovered only after he exits the PPP/C. Neither can I find one letter to the editor or article by Jeffrey calling for power-sharing or constitutional reform when he was with the PPP/C. Yet he seeks to portray the government’s record on governance as the worst the country ever experienced. On the contrary, in spite of its imperfections, the APNU+AFC coalition and government is not repressive: and is more representative ethnically and politically than the PPP/C in which Jeffrey was a minister.
In his column he made a futile attempt at contesting, what he conceded “..the WPA has over the years successfully projected itself as some kind of protector of the national political high-ground”. In support of his position, he posted that the WPA is now “into another zone” he offered (4) points. In (3) he wrote (in reference to Dr, David Hinds), “He tells us that within the coalition process ‘we are putting WPA’s traditional values (and) its political culture. ‘One must ask where is the WPA’s self-proclaimed multi-ethnic stance in all of this,’“. Is he saying that our presence in the coalition doesn’t enhance its multi-racial standing/appeal? I have to admit that I am not certain what he meant by, “ in all of this”. Or is he is suggesting that the WPA’s presence in the APNU+AFC coalition compromised the party’s historical stance on multiracial politics? On either score, I beg to disagree.
While the coalition is not the ideal manifestation of multi-racial politics envisioned by the WPA, it is the best the nation has achieved to date. Our presence in the coalition enhances its appeal and has not compromised our historical stance in any fundamental way – given the country’s political reality post-1992 elections. It is unrealistic to transplant the WPA politics of the 70s and 80s to the current situation. The persistence of racial/political polarization and the absence of a multiracial constituency objectively places limitations on multi-racial politics. This cannot be overlooked in an objective discourse?
My final observation. Jeffrey in his polemics makes an error when he reduces the WPA ‘s traditional values and its political culture to what he called our historical “multi-ethnic stand”. Doing so is a political fallacy and deception. He is learned enough and politically experienced to know better. But he conveniently chose to demonstrate a lack of a profound understanding, failing to recognize other dimensions of the party‘s traditional values and political culture which I will not address in this letter.
Yours faithfully,
Tacuma Ogunseye
