Citing conflict of interest concerns and an about-turn on the Amaila project, political analyst Henry Jeffrey says that the AFC has become as morally questioned as any of the historic political parties.

In a column in today’s Stabroek News,  Jeffrey asserted that the party had become afflicted with the “normal diseases of the political process: opportunity and hubris!”

He said however that while the recent events may be troublesome for the Alliance For Change (AFC), they are positive for the people of the country.

“Its relative youth had allowed that party to bask in the sun of moral superiority; giving encouragement to the many idealists who claim that Guyana can only be saved if so-called good people take power! While not denying that there are some good people and that we should encourage their proliferation, this was not a sustainable position, and I hope that experience with the AFC has now helped to dampen such ardour”, Jeffrey, a former long-serving PPP minister stated.

He said that he has argued continually that the country cannot depend upon finding good people or that even if that was done, they will remain good when faced daily by the “temptations of mammon. “

What the country needs most, he urged, are good systems that can lead to the instituting of proper policies and to the auditing and disciplining of defaulters.

Jeffrey, who also had a long association with PNC,  said the AFC’s recent positions on the Amaila hydro project, the Local Government Bills and the conflict of interest issues surrounding AFChairman Nigel Hughes and his wife Cathy “appear to be the straws that broke the camel’s back and gave rise to the defection of some of its most intellectually active members.

Jeffrey argued that since the AFC knows that its present advantageous position is largely because it was able to peel votes away from the PPP/C, its leadership is very sensitive to what it perceives the PPP/C constituency wants.

He said that by leaning towards the PPP/C on the Amaila issue, the AFC was seeking to stay as close as possible to what it saw as the prevailing sentiment among PPP/C backers.

“This opportunism placed it in the classical position of the tail wagging the dog. Furthermore, the leadership, convinced of its rightness, refused to give sufficient weight to its intellectual membership who viewed the Amaila project as some kind of a scam being perpetrated by the PPP/C on the people of Guyana”, Jeffrey argued.

He said it was on the local government bills that the public saw a true exhibition of hubris and opportunism from the AFC.  Believing that the PPP/C is weak and is weakening to the AFC’s advantage, Jeffrey noted that the AFC was “hell bent on taking the opportunity to test its strength regardless of how meaningful that election would have been” and this saw party leader Khemraj Ramjattan stating his willingness to go to local government elections with proposed reforms.

He said where the AFC has shot its moral self in the foot is in relation to the position it has taken on the issue of the Hugheses’ conflict of interest in relation to the Amaila project. Its Chairman Nigel Hughes is the company secretary for AFHP, which is the special purposes company that had been set up for the Amaila project.

“Firstly, since the Hughes’ relationship with the Amaila project could only have been possible with the knowledge and concurrence of the PPP/C regime, which, according to the AFC is evil incarnate, it begs the question of why the PPP/C would have made such a concession if not to gain some advantage and what advantage could it have foreseen?”, Jeffrey asked.

He noted that Amaila was not the first conflict of interest issue of this type which the AFC has had to deal with. He referred to a Stabroek News report addressing the matter of Ramjattan representing Fedders Lloyd Corporation which was one of the bidders for the specialty hospital, a project that the AFC had taken a strong public position on.

“On that occasion, Mr Nigel Hughes, whose party already knew that he was in a similar position in relation to the Amaila project, defended as follows: ‘There is no rule in the profession that stops Mr Ramjattan, who is a practising attorney, from plying his trade as a lawyer.’ Of course, the issue was never one of Mr Ramjattan having the right to practise his profession. It was whether professionals have the right to take the opportunity to serve two masters on the same issue!”, Jeffrey contended.

He said the AFC was able to quell the public concern in 2012 and may have thought that it was on safe ground on the Amaila issue but this was not to be and that Hughes “wisely accepted that a conflict existed, apologised to the public and resigned his position as party chairperson.” The party did not accept Hughes’ resignation and he remains as AFC Chairman.

Turning to Cathy Hughes who had done public relations work for Sithe Global, the then proposed major investor in Amaila, Jeffrey said that very little has been heard from Mrs Hughes.

“It is inexplicable, and can only be explained by the heightened vanity of actors who have lost all touch with reality and now take the public for granted, for the AFC not to feel the need for a reasonable time to elapse before allowing Mr Hughes to return to his chairmanship!  The party is now paying the price and will continue to do so for some time!”, Jeffrey posited.

extracted from the stabroeknews