The raison d’etre of political parties in T&T’s
political system is their goal of electing candidates to public
office, primarily to be able to form a government to implement
its policies and programmes.
Should it emerge a minority party, it would oppose the Government
in a manner that would hopefully persuade the electorate,
through its superior alternatives, to invest it with its franchise
at the succeeding election.
Political parties, generally, bring together groups of like-minded
persons capable of defining issues, even controversial ones,
compromising differences and achieving broad consensus on
the basis of which they can present a united front to the
electorate.
This has been pre-eminently the PNM experience these last
50 years, during which it has managed successfully, leadership
transition occasioned by death and electoral defeat.
PNM’s achievements have been due to the quality and integrity
of its leadership who, together with its generally disciplined
membership, demonstrates respect for the party’s constitutional
arrangements and
institutional structure.
These attributes have contributed significantly to the PNM
being viewed by the electorate as an effective political organisation
worthy of its trust and confidence which it has bestowed generously.
That the Opposition UNC has chosen to embrace a rather different
and confidence-destroying modus operandi prompts this question,
which has serious implications for T&T’s political
development: What impact will the shenanigans of the Opposition
UNC’s controlling cabal, that so dishonestly and blatantly
manipulates that party’s affairs, have
on T&T’s body politic, particularly the voting electorate?
The moral bankruptcy inherent in its actions should be a warning
to the nation that entrusting the State’s executive authority
into such politically and ethically-corrupt hands would be
nothing short of adventurism.
Engaging in double standards is rampant with this cabal, such
is its determination to maintain its hold on the UNC by any
means necessary.
Its contempt for UNC’s rank and file is palpable; its
only role, the cabal seems to think, is to invest it with
power without it being accountable to anyone.
Hence the cabal’s supreme indifference to the reaction
of the rank and file to its nefariousness. The cabal’s
double standards underscore its members‚ insincerity
and their political untrustworthiness.
As the party’s Political Leader Winston Dookeran so scathingly
said to them at a meeting last Wednesday evening, after he
had stormed out in disgust of an executive meeting: How can
they be for democracy, free elections and transparency in
the country, when they so brazenly disregard them in the party?
An attorney, at the same meeting, sighted the provision in
UNC’s constitution which sets out the duties and responsibilities
of the political leader: he is responsible to the party for
the exercise of its political affairs, in discharge of which
he is conferred with the authority to enlist the support of
the deputy political leaders. His authority includes setting
the party’s political agenda, which would include the
holding of meetings.
Clearly, a cabal within the executive is seeking to usurp
the responsibilities of the political leader in ways they
would never have dared during Panday’s incumbency.
The cabal is also removing quite arbitrarily parliamentarians
and executive members who are expressing support for the political
leader in his efforts to uphold UNC’s constitution and
advance its political agenda.
They have removed Robin Montano from the Senate for expressing
his opinions on party matters too forthrightly; they have
removed Ganga Singh as Chief Whip, again on free speech grounds;
they have removed Manohar Ramsaran from the executive; Roy
Augustus resigned from the Senate, “repulsed by the viciousness
emanating from certain members of UNC’s national executive
and the orchestrated nastiness currently dominating certain
radio programmes.”
For similar integrity reasons they have caused Yetming to
leave the UNC; Senator Seepersad-Bachan is clearly a marked
person; they have treated operations officer Sadiq Baksh’s
(chairman of the membership committee) letter—addressed
to the political leader—concerning the readmission of
Ramesh Maharaj with contempt, and proceeded to readmit Maharaj
despite the political leader’s protestations; they are
threatening the political leader with disciplinary action
and have suspended Gary Griffith from the executive, allegedly
on suspicion of inimical activities, without hearing him.
Interestingly, it was Griffith, sighting the relevant constitutional
provisions, who wrote UNC’s general secretary—not
the political leader—filing a formal complaint against
Deputy Political Leader Jack Warner, accusing him of several
serious constitutional violations, including reckless attacks
against UNC’s two political leaders, all repeatedly done
with great publicity.
Consistent with their double standards, the executive ignored
Griffith’s formal complaint which was supported with
evidence, choosing instead, to act against him, on an ad hoc
complaint without evidence and without hearing him. Not content
with this, they also want to direct the political leader when
and where to speak and what meetings he may or may not attend.
Most humiliatingly, they are conveying these directions through
the vice chairman, the integrity of whose party election victory
is highly suspect, an outcome that exposes UNC’s internal
procedures and those who endorse them to public odium and
contempt. Such lawless political management, reflecting a
gangsterism of the spirit will, unchecked, cause the UNC to
descend into chaos.
The cabal’s decision will undoubtedly create added division.
Did Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar support Ramesh’s
readmission? She must know with Panday absent Ramesh will
settle for nothing less than the combined positions of political
leader and opposition leader.
The rampant executive has therefore introduced a new element
of friction into UNC’s internal politics.
In any truly participatory political party, such patently
destabilising developments would have produced a groundswell
of alarm and adverse reaction from party organs and its general
membership.
Such would certainly have been the case within the PNM. The
deafening silence within the UNC over these excesses is certainly
removing it from being a serious national political contender.
While there will always be a hard-core base, profound disenchantment
will cause it to shrink.
Refusal to reject openly the cabal’s insistence on salvation
and resurrection, through disgraced and discredited leadership,
will certainly alienate all but UNC’s decimated hard-core.
Within the UNC, has judgment fled to brutish beasts, and have
men lost their reason?
e-mail: opm_nsa@tstt.net.tt
