GEORGETOWN, Guyana, CMC – The minor opposition Working People’s Alliance (WPA) says the June 12 Local Government Elections (LGE) should be used “as a day of national resistance and African uprising” in Guyana.
WPA executive member, Tacuma Ogunseye, told a public meeting that “the WPA wants to make it clear that the Local Government Elections offer us a good opportunity to start the resistance.”
He told the public meeting in Buxton, East Coast Demerara, that the opposition parties should not spend large amounts of money and deploy persons to contest the elections because the ruling People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPPC)-dominated Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) has been already fixed to rig those polls.
“We in the Working People’s Alliance wish to suggest to you, and we will suggest this formally to our opposition partners, that instead of mobilizing to participate in the elections on election day, we mobilize to turn (LGE) as a day of national resistance and African uprising,” Ogunseye told the public meeting.
But the leader of the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR)-led opposition grouping, A Partnership for National Unity (APNU), Aubrey Norton.” At the same time, he supports the WPA’s proposed day of resistance. The opposition needed to maintain representation on councils in its strongholds.
“My people, we can take two approaches. I agree with a day of resistance, but I’m afraid I have to disagree we should leave Buxton-Foulis NDC (Neighbourhood Council) in the hands of the PPP. I’m not going to agree with that,” he said.
Norton said the opposition would not cede its strongholds, such as Georgetown, Linden, and New Amsterdam, to the PPP.
“We have said whatever means we use, we will not allow the PPP to control our strongholds. Imagine that we got the council in Georgetown, and they are breaking up the vendor’s stalls…We will do everything to ensure that they fail while at the same time resisting them,” Norton told the public meeting.
Political observers said Norton’s appearance at the public meeting marked the first time a PNCR Leader has ever spoken on a WPA public meeting platform.
The WPA left the APNU after the controversial March 2020 general and regional elections that brought the PPP to power, and Ogunseye urged the Guyanese to get “battle ready.”
“We come to tell you that freedom is not far away. We come to tell you that we will ensure that our brothers and sisters in uniform do the right thing, and this will be over quickly,” he said.
WPA executive member David Hinds said, “for now, we are not going to indulge in your farcical election unless we have a clean voters list.”
He said he remains confident that there would be a clean voters list as that would lead to electoral victory and superior policies.
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